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The Vengeance of the 
Fenjale 



. wr- 







A street in SAN REMO 




Vengeance of the 
Female 

EDITED BY ^ 

MARRION WILCOX 

AUTHOR OF “a SHORT HISTORY OF THE WAR 
WITH Spain” 



HERBERT S. STONE ^ COMPANY 
CHICAGO esf NEW YORK 
MDCCCXCIX 



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33252 


COPYRIGHT 1899 BY 
HERBERT S. STONE & CO. 


Twoeo^jrs »9?cj:fVEO. 



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Preface 

For solemn nonsense, commend us to the 
truly great. 

Last May, at the annual meeting of the 
Primrose League, Lord Salisbury gave utter- 
ance to a foreboding of what would happen to 
Spain and certain other countries. “These 
states,” the English Premier observed, “are 
becoming weaker, and the strong states 
stronger”; and he pointed out that the “liv- 
ing nations” would gradually encroach upon 
the territory of the “dying states.” 

Quite recently one of the influential jour- 
nals had this to say: “The attention of the 
world is being called, to-day as never before, 
to the plight of the nations which pass by the 
name of ‘Latin, ’ as indicating peculiarities of 
temperament or character which differentiate 
them from the rest of mankind. If only one of 
the three leading Latin states — France, Spain, 
and Italy — were proving unfortunate, the mat- 
ter would seem no more puzzling than the mis- 
fortunes of an individual man ; but when you 
have the whole three apparently going to the 
dogs, while the rest of Christendom is flour- 
ishing, political philosophers are kept un- 


PREFACE 


nsually busy speculating and analyzing about 
causes and consequences.” 

“Dying” and “going to the dogs”? 

These people are children. The reason 
why they do not know how to govern them- 
selves; why they care so much for love; why 
they are so cruel and blindly passionate when 
they hate? 

They are children. 

* * * 

Some of the chapters of this book have 
appeared before, though not precisely in their 
present form, in Harper'' s Magazine and else- 
where. The publishers’ permission to reprint 
these in their proper connection is gratefully 
acknowledged. M. W. 

New York, April i8, 1899. 


vi 


Vignettes and Studies: Spanish- 
American and Spanish 


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I 

From New York to Seville 

It will be easier for us to understand the 
distant Spaniard if we begin with a glimpse 
of Spanish-American life, don’t you think 
so? And besides, we can tell about two 
of the people who were afterward of the 
household in Seville — about Vincent and 
Gloria. To be sure, that story about Vin- 
cent and Gloria has been told once already, 
but to very few persons. If you happen 
to remember, the question about their en- 
gagement was. How ever had Dr. Vincent 
managed to propose? 

In the first place, how did he screw up 
his courage and call to his aid the requisite 
number of words? Dr. Vincent had met 
Gloria at Newport. He immediately fell in 
love with her, and she with him; but as 
they were both reticent people, it took 
them two years to make this known to one 
another. Still another year elapsed before 
their friends became aware of the inter- 


3 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


esting fact. Surely, no one would have 
guessed such a thing. Gloria was appar- 
ently the most indifferent person in the 
world — indifferent especially to attention 
from gentlemen. Her sisters looked at her 
in wonder. 

In the second place, how did he get the 
chance? Surely, he must have said it in 
the presence of her two sisters, Isabelita and 
Teresa, of her mother and mamita (grand- 
mother), and of her cousin, the musician, 
for these were never upon any occasion 
absent. 

It must have been on one of those even- 
ings when the three young men stole in by 
way of the balcony during the time of 
‘‘Papa Turo’s” (grandfather’s) illness; when 
neither mother nor mamita could leave him 
for an instant, and Cousin Louis was away 
in Havana. It must have been then. 

How different those three couples were! 

First, Isabelita, the elder sister, crazy to 
see Manuel, waiting for him in fretful impa- 
tience, standing at the window, and with 
longing eyes looking up and down the dusky 
street, not only acknowledging to her sisters 
that she had made the appointment with 
him, but also wishing the entire neighbor- 
4 


FROM NEW YORK TO SEVILLE 


hood to appreciate her good fortune. 
Manuel, half Spanish, half American, 
thought this sort of thing fine fun, and 
really cared for Isabelita a little. When he 
arrived, Isabelita and he sat on the balcony 
— he being funny and Isabelita laughing and 
flirting immoderately and wishing that he 
would be more serious, in a certain way, 
and more personal. 

Gloria, next in order of seniority, fanning 
herself as though she had no other object 
in life than to keep cool and dainty, said 
she expected no one, although inwardly 
assured of Dr. Vincent’s approach. She 
waited just in front of the window under 
the chandelier, and when Dr. Vincent came 
he sat there also. Thus they both made 
sure that no person would even suspect 
them of wishing to talk of anything but the 
weather or mutual friends. 

In the back corner of the parlor — the cor- 
ner most comfortable, most becoming, and 
most convenient for flirtation — Teresa, or 
Baby, as she was called in the family, ex- 
pected some new man from time to time. 
Well, she had great sleepy eyes and a 
figure like the queen of love’s. That was 
her talent. 


5 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


It must have been on one of those even- 
ings that Vincent said, ‘‘Will you?” and 
Gloria answered, ‘ ‘ I will. ’ ' 

But that was the calm part of it, for great 
was the indignation and wrath of Sefiora 
Diaz — and even greater the wrath and 
indignation of the old, dark-skinned ‘‘ma- 
mita” — when it became known that Dr. 
Vincent had dared to propose to Gloria. Let 
this not be misunderstood. Dr. Vincent 
was an unobjectionable person, a young 
man who had inherited money and who 
knew how to employ leisure time without 
practicing medicine. The trouble was that 
he had found opportunity to speak to a 
Spanish maiden alone. For Dios! What 
was the girl thinking of? How could she 
so forget herself? It seemed a shame and a 
family disgrace. 

This is how the fact came out — it was 
Alfredo’s doing. 

Alfredo was the youngest member of the 
Diaz family, and spoiled by all. But then, 
he was a beautiful child, five or six years 
old, very fat, with dark skin and eyes like 
two coals, red cheeks and short black hair, 
the whitest teeth ever seen and cherry-red 
lips. He was an imp of naughtiness, never 
6 


FROM NEW YORK TO SEVILLE 


out of mischief. He spoke English in a 
very odd manner, translating directly from 
the Spanish, and using all the largest words 
he could pick up. His arms or legs were 
always in motion, especially when he was 
speaking. Then his hands had as much if 
not more to say than his mouth. He 
amused himself in various ways — for in- 
stance : 

His mother, sitting in the back parlor 
with her sewing-basket in her lap; Fredo 
playing near. He would go to her, put his 
arm around her and say, “Dear, nice, 
pretty Mamma T ona ! ’ ' — then throw her bas- 
ket on the floor. 

He would take the dust from the dustpan 
as soon as the servant had finished sweep- 
ing a room and sprinkle it over the floor. 
“Because,” he said, “the girl had not 
enough work to do.” Having heard his 
mother make this remark, he desired to 
arrange things so that she might earn her 
wages. 

One day at dinner Alfredo began, “Ah, 
ha! mamita, and whom did we meet to-day 
in Broadway, eh?” 

Gloria, whom he had accompanied, mak- 
ing signs for him to keep still, interposed, 
7 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


^‘Why, Fredo, we met lots of people; and 
don’t you know the nice candy Gloria 
bought for you?” 

“Oh, yes; but I have eaten it all up 
now — and Mr. What’s-his-name, you know, 
Gloria, the one who walked with us!” 

“Gloria,” cried the mother, sternly, “how 
does this happen? Who walked with you?” 

“Why, mamma, I could not help it! We 
met Mr. — I mean Dr. Vincent, and — ” 

“You could not help it!” Sefiora Diaz 
interrupted. “Go to your room, and I will 
see you presently.” (Exit Gloria in tears.) 
“Now, Fredo, tell mamma what the gen- 
tleman said to sister. ’ ’ 

* * * 

However, Sefiora Diaz was forced to con- 
sent, as her husband was disposed to look 
with favor upon the match. So, after many 
tears had been shed by the female members 
of the Diaz family, Gloria was declared en- 
gaged to the doctor. 

Then began a desire on his part to take 
his fiancee to the play, and, behold! she 
informed him that mamma, mamita, Isa- 
belita and Baby must also go. And so they 
did — many times — until the poor doctor 
8 


FROM NEW YORK TO SEVILLE 


grew weary of wandering around with five 
ladies. 

Dr. Vincent, as a well-to-do bachelor, 
was, in his own quiet way, self-respecting. 
He protested. 

First of all, he appealed to the mother. 

Sefiora Diaz had been married at the age 
of fifteen to her first cousin — a brute. 

She was a very hard-working woman, 
especially interested, as Spanish housewives 
are, in the cooking, which is abominable — 
unless you happen to like it. She had three 
objects in life: First, to keep the furnace 
red-hot, and never to open door or window ; 
second, to keep her daughters most strictly 
under Spanish rules, and thus guard against 
their tendency to become Americanized; 
third, to ward off disease from her family, 
which she understood to mean bundling 
with flannels and baking in the house as 
aforesaid. Dressed in deep mourning all 
her life, she had done her best to wear her- 
self out ; but have we not noticed that peo- 
ple do not wear themselves out in this 
manner? She was fat to grossness, had a 
rather flat nose, a wheedling voice and soft 
manners. She was kindness personified, 
but she was broken-spirited. You noticed 


9 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


that she showed a bit of temper when Al- 
fredo exposed his sister’s misconduct? Well, 
in the one matter of propriety, a Spanish 
mother retains her stiffness to the end. 

While Dr. Vincent was waiting for Seflora 
Diaz, he criticised the appearance of the 
house for the first time. When Gloria had 
been present, he had seen only her. Now 
he noticed dust and was apprehensive of 
garlic; now he objected to the furniture, 
which was very rich. In the long parlor 
the girls had evidently tried American 
touches — bows here and there, and bric-k- 
brac. These looked out of place. To his 
irritated sense some perverse and mischiev- 
ous spirit whispered that it was not a model 
establishment ; that when company was 
expected the litter of the ground floor 
would be thrown into a closet, and for a 
week afterward this closet would be searched 
for missing articles; that in the bedrooms 
were comfortable beds, mirrors large and 
low, but no prim little things; that on the 
bureau one would be sure to see a large 
saucer for powder, in it a piece of glove 
instead of a puff ; on the table, high-heeled 
shoes, perhaps (and well placed, too, such 
pretty shoes!), while dainty underclothing 


lO 


FROM NEW YORK TO SEVILLE 


would lie here and there; that the beds 
were used as lounges and catch-alls; that 
things for beautifying the person were to be 
found in tropical abundance and perplexing 
variety, but in no particular set place, for 
they who used them dressed all over the 
house, from one room to another; that Isa- 
belita made the top drawer of her bureau, 
without lock or key, a place of concealment 
for Manuel’s letters. 

The doctor’s interview with Seftora Diaz 
was brief. He stated his position, and she 
referred him to mamita. She was ruled by 
her in everything, she said. 

The mamita was fatter, more positive, 
and, of course, fifteen or twenty years older 
than Seftora Diaz. Those were the only 
apparent points of difference. She was 
filled with Cuban notions about bringing up 
children. She thought the Americans an 
ill-behaved nation; and, knowing none of 
them herself, desired that her family should 
be equally exclusive. 

In her manner with the doctor, the ma- 
mita was like a child. She had her own 
cause of complaint, of long standing. She 
scarcely waited for him to conclude the 
statement of his grievance before she began. 

II 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


Was it credible? Yes, it was a fact. Her 
granddaughters wanted to become Ameri- 
can ! In cut and fit their dresses accorded 
with the American fashion ; but, she admit- 
ted, they could not help wearing bright 
colors, especially red and yellow, and put- 
ting powder on their faces. They were not 
yet altogether degenerate. Then, too, their 
dresses were picturesquely disordered — for 
the misguided creatures were born Spanish. 
They remembered that the Spanish woman 
is to think herself nice merely because she 
is a woman, whether she be nicely kept or 
not. Santa Maria! They had not yet 
quite forgotten the land of their birth. 
But her granddaughters remained good 
mimics and gossips, and all the saints should 
be invoked to preserve them from becom- 
ing studious. They could write a note, 
they could count; why should they know 
geography and those things — and wear 
glasses? They knew how to play or sing 
and embroider. Ave Maria! they were 
accomplished, and lazy, and darkly reli- 
gious, and timorous, except with gentle- 
men. Well did they know that a woman 
can trust nothing in the world but a gentle- 
man. 


I2 


FROM NEW YORK TO SEVILLE 

'‘But,” Dr. Vincent objected, “very lit- 
tle trust or confidence has been shown me!'' 

This was logic. Mamita was dazed, but 
not convinced. It was not necessary to be 
consistent at her time of life. 

“Ask our cousin, the musician,” she 
said. “He is a Cuban. He knows.” 

Dr. Vincent went to the Spanish hotel 
in Street. 

“Is Mr. Louis Diaz in?” he asked. 

“I don’t knows, but I’ll find outs,” said 
the clerk, who betrayed a sibilant South 
American dialect by squandering the letter 
“s” upon his English words with prodigal 
unconcern. “Here, Juan, go up to rooms 
20 and see if Seftor Diaz ’s there.” 

Juan went up the stairs, singing and spin- 
ning a piece of money in his hand to amuse 
himself. 

Half an hour passed. 

Again at the desk Dr. Vincent put his 
question. 

The clerk looked as if nothing had hap- 
pened, rang a bell and waited. After a 
while the same boy appeared. 

“Here, Juan, iss Seftor Diaz at homes?” 

“Oh, I forgot! No, he isn’t.” 

“How do you know?” 

13 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


‘‘ I knocked/' 

'‘How many times?" 

“Once." 

“Go ups and knocks agains. Perhaps he 
wass asleeps." 

Around the stove in the office there was 
a group of Cuban men who apparently 
found the climate of New York trying. 
They were wrapped in overcoats and hud- 
dled together like so many monkeys, attest- 
ing their humanity, however, by smoke. 
Each gentleman had a cigarette in his 
mouth, which he would remove only to 
curse some one for opening a door. If it 
had been a little cooler they would have 
been sitting upon one another to keep 
warm. They were melancholy. They loved 
to be melancholy. They drank black 
coffee, and smoked excessively, and com- 
posed dance music that had a lively move- 
ment but an underlying melancholy strain 
throughout; composed verses, also, about 
empty nests and blighted hopes. 

These men had missed the priceless 
discipline of healthy boyhood. Children 
until they reached the age of sixteen, they 
suddenly became men. The change was 
instantaneous. One fine evening they were 
H 


FROM NEW YORK TO SEVILLE 


put to bed early by nurse or mother; the 
next they were at a ball in full evening 
dress, with flaring cuffs and low-cut collar, 
making hot love to every woman present, 
young or old. 

Have you never marked the veteran air 
of one of these fledglings? ‘^Our women 
are pretty playthings,” he is saying. ‘'They 
must have no cares. If they are naughty, 
we beat them.” 

In his own good time Juan returned, say- 
ing, “No, he is not there.” 

“Fools!” cried the clerk, “idiots! Why 
didn’t yous remind me that Seftor Diaz 
’sgone to give a concert in Bostons, eh?” 

Then as a last resort Dr. Vincent betook 
himself to the head of the family of his 
fiancee. 

At his place of business he found this ter- 
rible person — a stout, handsome man, with 
abundant black hair and heavy mustache 
and imperial — whom he had never seen at 
his home, where everybody except Alfredo 
feared even to speak of “papa dear.” 

“Papa dear” was very much insulted. 
It was altogether improper for a young lady 
to go out without her family. What did 
Dr. Vincent take him for? Allow his 


15 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


daughter to go to the play alone with a 
gentleman? Never! 

Then the quiet doctor set his snare. 
*‘Have you not consented to trust me with 
your daughter for life, sir?” 

*^Yes, certainly.” 

‘‘Well, you might trust me for one even- 
ing.” 

^'That is quite another thing,” said 
Seflor Diaz, so intolerantly that Dr. Vin- 
cent lost his temper. 

“Well, then,” he declared, “I cannot 
think of marrying Miss Gloria if her family 
have such a bad opinion of me.” So he 
put on his hat and left the office abruptly. 

Not one of his friends would have recog- 
nized the usually deliberate Dr. Vincent in 
the figure that hurried along Broadway. 
He was excited as he probably had never 
been before ; and yet he was not planning 
an elopement, or even devising means to 
induce Gloria to marry him out of hand. 
A term had been fixed for their engage- 
ment, and he was not vain enough to be- 
lieve that she would do anything rash for 
his sake. No. He was muttering over and 
over again to himself, “I shall give her up!” 
He was angry. 

i6 


FROM NEW YORK TO SEVILLE 


Now Dr. Vincent had one confidant, 
and he was making all haste to tell to it his 
distress and his resolve. When he reached 
his rooms, in a quiet up-town street, he took 
his confidant from its case and tuned it. 

Ah ! but a man who loves can play ; and 
the man who does not love can only per- 
form. What harsh and grating sounds his 
violin gave forth that afternoon! 

But as the room darkened and the fire 
grew brighter and the luxury of his sur- 
roundings began to mellow his spirit, a vis- 
ion of beauty rose before him. There she 
seemed to be reclining upon the cushions 
of his great lounging-chair. Black eyes, 
set deep in the head, with dark lids and 
long, silky lashes; brows and complexion 
unequaled in the world of realities. Such 
a white skin, such pink cheeks, and the 
most delightful lips that always wore a soft 
smile! The eyes were half closed. 

Then Dr. Vincent’s violin spoke to the 
vision in a voice of passionate love, infinitely 
sweet. 

This man, who seldom trusted to words 
the expression of an idea or sentiment above 
the commonplace, was not a commonplace 
person after all. He had the soul and the 

17 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


skill of a great artist, for he was able to utter 
those deeper feelings in the language of 
music. Yet not one of us had the faintest 
suspicion of such a thing until the following 
Thursday evening. 

The following Thursday evening a recep- 
tion was held at Seflora Diaz’s. All her 
friends were there — even “papa dear” put 
in an appearance. 

The Spanish- Americans are very fond of 
one another’s society, and their receptions 
are not formal but cordial. Each member of 
every family is invited, from youngest to old- 
est, and all come! To invite one or two out 
of a family would be a positive insult. When 
they are met they do little dancing, but they 
play games, and there is always music. 

As the evening in question wore on, and 
different people had performed in one de- 
lightful fashion and another. Cousin Louis 
having played his very best, and distin- 
guished amateurs of both sexes having sung, 
some one remarked, in a pause which fol- 
lowed one of these songs, that he had seen 
a violin case in the hall, and wished to 
know to whom it belonged and why the 
owner, whoever he or she might be, had 
not brought it in before 

i8 


FROM NEW YORK TO SEVILLE 


Cousin Louis pointed out Dr. Vincent, 
and said he had seen him bring it. Dr. 
Vincent laughed in evident embarrassment, 
and seemed inclined to deny the charge; 
but when Louis stepped out into the hall 
and presently returned with the violin in 
his hand, Vincent was surrounded on all 
sides and his honor thrust upon him. 

Standing there in their midst, he laugh- 
ingly tuned the instrument, declaring at the 
same time that these were the only notes 
that he could produce. Indeed, it looked 
as though he were fooling with the thing 
and knew little or nothing about it, in 
such a light manner he held and used it. 
But suddenly he stepped out from the 
throng into an open space. Then he 
glanced just once at Gloria, who was watch- 
ing him eagerly from her corner, and began. 
At the first accord made by the bow drawn 
over the strings the company started in 
amazement; at the second, dead silence 
reigned, and the perfect artist was alone in 
his own world, unless, indeed, it would be 
truer to say that he and Gloria, in the midst 
of all that company, were alone. 

Such a picture he made! His whole soul 
seemed to be poured forth in those deli- 


19 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


cious sounds, and with him he carried his 
listeners. Each face in the room was a 
study of unconsciousness. 

He may have played for an hour, so 
much was expressed. It was the story of 
a whole life. Or perhaps it was but for an 
instant, so finished was the sweetness and 
beauty of that music. 

When he lifted his head and let the in- 
strument fall to his side, the whole room 
for one second remained in the same still- 
ness. In fact, it was as still as though a 
whole world full of the cares that make life 
verbose had died; and in that sense all 
those people were still as death, and then 
of a sudden with one impulse everybody 
sprang up and surrounded him, shouting, 
screaming hoarsely. Cousin Louis rushed 
to Dr. Vincent, and throwing his arms about 
him, kissed him on both cheeks, tears stand- 
ing in his eyes, and crying, Bravo, amigo 
mio, bravo!” And then the company 
seized upon Dr. Vincent, and beat him and 
pulled his hair and pinched and slapped 
him; one man who could not get near to 
Vincent himself taking the violin and mak- 
ing horrible sounds on it to express the 
pleasure he had experienced. They were 


20 


FROM NEW YORK TO SEVILLE 


all too wild even to let the artist play an 
encore. 

In the midst of this confusion, supper 
was announced, and at the sound, “Eh, 
supper! supper!” every one screamed. 
You see it suddenly came to be like a pub- 
lic affair. Some one called out, “Make way 
for the king of musicians!” and before he 
could refuse, Vincent was lifted by strong 
arms and borne in triumph from the room 
and seated in the place of honor at the head 
of the longest table. All cheered the 
louder at this, and Louis cried, “Before we 
eat, we must drink the health of our artist 
king!” The suggestion was immediately 
carried out, after which the supper pro- 
gressed in an exceedingly noisy manner. 
It was amusing to look about the tables and 
see the different attitudes of the various 
people as they discussed Vincent’s playing. 
One man was drawing an imaginary bow 
over an imaginary violin, perhaps saying to 
his friend, “The way in which he played 
those high notes!” You might see a lady 
and gentleman sitting together, eating and 
talking at the same time, the gentleman, 
after having exhausted his lungs in praise 
of the wonderful musician, moving his head 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


and eyes upward, as though to say, ‘Ht was 
divine!” In one corner was a crowd of 
ladies, who had been served and then left 
to themselves, each trying to say more than 
the others, one of them drawing all the 
fingers of her pretty hand into a bunch and 
kissing them, as though she were exclaim- 
ing, ‘'And how good-looking he is!” 

Finally, after their dry throats had been 
wet with red wine, and their appetites satis- 
fied, their thoughts once more turned to 
music. They entreated Vincent. He did 
not refuse, but chose a strain so sad that 
when it was finished his hearers had not the 
spirit even to applaud. It was a greater 
triumph than the first. Taking his violin, 
without bidding any one adieu, he left the 
company. 

As for the other guests, they were in such 
a dejected state that very soon afterward 
they too went home, so subdued by the 
delightful feeling of melancholy that every 
one made love to his or her escort, whether 
that was strictly allowable or not. 

When the last guest had departed, “papa 
dear” marched up to Gloria. Without re- 
laxing his stern manner he said: “This is 


22 


FROM NEW YORK TO SEVILLE 


quite a different matter. To the artist 
everything is permitted. Your Dr. Vincent 
may take you to purgatory alone — alone, 
do you understand? — if he will come here 
and make paradise for me before you 
start.'' 


23 


From New York to Seville — 
(Continued) 

Vincent and Gloria were married soon 
afterward, and for several years continued 
to live in New York. The mere fact that 
they were married to each other was in 
itself sufficient, and it did not come into 
the mind of either of them that another 
place might be better. They lived in the 
indicative mood, present tense, repeating 
to each other, “I am, thou art, we are,” 
and taking no thought of might, could, 
would or should. 

In this positive, straightforward, simple 
part of their conjugation — their present 
almost perfect — to him she was constantly 
an expression or express image of those 
hidden thoughts and ideal strivings which 
he so seldom uttered; and to her he was 
still transfigured and glorified by virtue of 
his having once or twice dared for her sake 
to disclose the depth and strength and 
beauty of his nature. 


24 


FROM NEW YORK TO SEVILLE 


After several years, however, they both 
had a touch of the subjunctive. This is 
how it came about — their conversation may 
be given without change of a syllable. 

(At that time, it should be premised, 
Gloria was not yet quite an invalid.) 

Gloria said, “Don’t you think — some- 
body — mamita, in fact — thought it might 
be better — “ 

“For him?” Vincent asked. 

“Him!” cried Gloria. “It may be her. 
It might be better for It not to be in the 
city when It first comes.” 

Vincent deliberated. “Yes,” he said; 
“and we should be happy in the country 
ourselves.” 

Nothing further was said at the time by 
either of them. We know their habit of 
silence, and could easily have guessed, by 
the tender and dreamy expression of her 
face, in what quarter Gloria’s thoughts were 
busied. As for Vincent, he was reflecting 
that his own earliest associations had been 
rural, in harmless freedom ; and his features 
were lighted by the whimsically tolerant 
smile of a modern amateur in philosophy, 
who reasons: “Whether it be true or not 
that a child imbibes the love of beauty, and 


25 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


so a noble ambition, from country scenes, 
we must at least be certain that our boy will 
have to enjoy flowers and all that kind of 
thing soon after he is born, or he will never 
do it keenly ; for after a while he will begin 
to smoke.” 

So a transfer was agreed upon without 
discussion, and they changed their residence 
to a town in the vicinity of New York, 
where they passed a season of suspense and 
anxious expectation in which their vocabu- 
lary was almost limited to I, thou, we — and 
he, she or it. The close of this period was 
marked by a burst of happiness that may 
not be adequately described, for the reason 
that very good experiences of life are only 
to be known by their fruits. This best 
experience will surely teach one to pity, 
and it may inspire some genial work to 
which brain and heart contribute equally; 
but the reader will apprehend its full mean- 
ing to Gloria and Vincent by dwelling upon 
the significance of the following transposi- 
tion of pronouns, and the emphatic position 
of the first: 

He, thou, we, I. 

* * * 

When the boy was old enough to stand 
26 


FROM NEW YORK TO SEVILLE 


a sea voyage they decided to spend a few 
months in Seville. They had often thought 
about it, of course — being such as they 
were — and had cared to visit it; and then 
their friend, Rodriguez, had been talking to 
them about it. ‘^Even if you were a 
stranger passing through its streets,’' he 
had assured them, “you would say there is 
no other city which is a paradise. You 
would see through the archway of each 
house a beautiful court within, with flower- 
ing plants and a fountain in the center, 
where the family meet, and friends come, 
and the most wonderful stories are told. ’’ 
And when they had decided to make this 
journey they were delighted to hear that 
there was no satisfactory guide-book to 
Spain. “We shall be delivered from the 
oppression of guide-books,” they said. 
“We shall be guided by our own sympa- 
thies — away from shows and show places ; 
we shall pass our time in enjoying the In- 
timate Thing.” 


Ill 

The Intimate Thing 

Looking down on Seville from a great 
height, as from the top of the Moorish tower 
called the Giralda, one thinks this the most 
compactly built of cities. All the houses 
clustering in a circle seem to be under one 
roof, so narrow are the streets, so small the 
open places. Fitted into an elbow of the 
Guadalquivir and surrounded by a vast cul- 
tivated plain, the city looks somewhat like 
one great circular building with an irregular 
and variegated roof, upon which — upon the 
roof itself — people are moving about. 

That view of flat, livable housetops fasci- 
nated the Vincents, and soon from their own 
azotea (as they learned to call it) they 
began to take their first quiet observations 
of the life of the city in the streets, in the 
balconies and windows, and on the neigh- 
boring housetops. (Of course their particu- 
lar azotea was neither more nor less than 


28 


THE INTIMATE THING 


the roof of the house that sheltered Dolores 
and Anita and General Cordoba’s family and 
Mr. Taswell Langdon and Mr. Sullivan and 
others whom I am to tell about. If it had 
really been any other house I should have 
feigned that it was the same.) Well, the 
pavement of this azotea, composed of large 
red square bricks, was, almost level; it was 
surrounded by a parapet three feet in 
height; beside the parapet stood several 
rows of plants in earthenware jars; and 
beyond this agreeable foreground were 
other azoteas and other flowering plants in 
endless sequence, until the view was closed 
on one side by the gray mass of the cathe- 
dral, and on the other side by the blue and 
white and brown church dedicated to San 
Pablo. 

Leaning over the parapet, they looked 
down into the street below. A cab was 
standing at the corner, and its driver, on 
catching sight of a promising ^Hare,” called 
attention to himself and invited the man to 
enter his carriage by hissing like a snake. 

“That seems to be the usual means em- 
ployed to attract notice,” said Vincent. 

“A hiss means ‘look back’ or ‘look 
here,’ ” Gloria murmured at his side; “and 
29 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


we shall be hearing the sound from morning 
till night, indoors and out/’ 

‘‘As though to prove Seville a paradise 
by constant reminder of the serpent,*’ Vin- 
cent had begun to say ; but then a carriage 
passed. The ladies in it caught sight of an 
acquaintance ; thereupon they stretched out 
their arms, opening and shutting their hands 
repeatedly. That would seem to mean that 
they wanted one to come to them ; but no, 
it only means, “How do you do?’’ 

“See that old fat priest,’’ said Gloria, 
“holding up his skirts and tip-toeing like a 
woman across a muddy place.’’ 

At a distance, and yet to be seen from 
this azotea^ was a foundling hospital called 
the Cuna. In the wall was a small, square 
door. Vincent and Gloria saw a veiled per- 
son furtively approach and ring a bell. 
The door opened mechanically and disclosed 
a cradle, in which the veiled person laid 
something very gently, and departed un- 
questioned. And Gloria drew back and 
went to look down into the court of their 
own house. There a maid of all work was 
on her knees, scrubbing the marble pave- 
ment. She was singing a Moorish lament; 
she had a red carnation stuck in her hair; 


3Q 


THE INTIMATE THING 


she was decidedly good-looking; she it was 
who began to wash the dining-room floor 
that day while all the guests were still 
seated at table. 

But presently Vincent called to Gloria, 
and together they leaned over the parapet 
to watch two women whose little tilted 
steps — so quick, yet with slight progres- 
sion — made the perspective of the street 
seem at fault. Couldn’t you tell, from the 
sliding, self-approving tone of their conver- 
sation (you could catch the tone, though 
not the words), that Liseta had been saying 
to Papita, “Let others be beautiful; let me 
be fat” ? 

And the little church Liseta and Papita 
were leaving on the right — that would be 
worth looking into. One day Mr. Taswell 
Langdon was passing by that little church, 
and through the open door saw that the 
sacristan was up on a ladder washing a win- 
dow, and at the same time making responses 
to the priest who was saying mass. At the 
foot of the ladder stood the sacristan’s 
young son. 

Mr. Langdon heard the priest intoning, 
“Dominus vobiscum — ’’ 

And the boy at the foot of the ladder 
31 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


calling, ^‘Papa, little mother wants you to 
send some money, for there’s no bread in 
the house.” 

And the sacristan, from the top of the 
ladder, threatening with his wash-cloth, 
responding to boy and priest in the same 
breath: “Go to the dickens, or I’ll throw 
this at you . — Et cum spiritu tuo.'' 

And from their azotea Vincent and Gloria 
saw a pretty example of the Spanish cus- 
tom of following. They saw Anita and her 
maid returning from a walk, and young 
Mono following Anita home — but ever fol- 
lowing at a respectful distance. He was 
content to watch her mincing, high-heeled 
gait, and to hear the passing men, even 
coachmen on their boxes, exclaim to each 
other at sight of her, “Andaluza pura!” 
condensing all praise into the words “pure 
Andalusian,” breaking off any other talk 
in order to say it, with eyebrows raised in 
admiration. Meeting a priest, who was 
Anita’s father-confessor, the women stopped 
to speak with him, and Anita reverently 
kissed his hand. Then they passed on, and 
Mono joined the priest, whom he also knew. 
The priest held out the hand that Anita 
had just kissed. Mono, instead of merely 
32 


THE INTIMATE THING 


shaking it, as men do, raised it toward his 
lips, intending to steal what had been given 
to the Church; but he reckoned without 
the quick intelligence of the good confes- 
sor, who had not reached the age of sixty 
without learning what most men know. 
There was a clean upward stroke of the 
reverend hand, from the flexible reverend 
wrist, passing Mono’s mouth and neatly 
snubbing his nose. 

Then both men laughed a little — the 
younger man with constraint — and sepa- 
rated. 

When Anita entered the house and the 
door closed behind her. Mono looked up- 
ward, and in general recognition of ‘"her 
family,” as he would have said, bowed to 
the Vincents, whose smiling faces, project- 
ing beyond the parapet, were looking down 
at him. 

I don’t think I need explain what Vin- 
cent and Gloria understood by their expres- 
sion “The Intimate Thing.” You will 
understand it as well as they. “The In- 
timate Thing is the true joy,” Vincent used 
to say. 

And what delight they took in some of 
the streets! How fortunate for them, as 


33 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


well as for Seville, that the city was planned 
and built by people who knew how to live 
in a hot climate — that the old town was 
such a network of narrow and tortuous 
lanes, paved with square blocks of stone, 
passing between closely built Oriental 
houses. They could appreciate the wisdom 
of the Moors. When in the bright plazas 
and wider modern streets the heat was intol- 
erable, the dark lanes were always cool. 
Even the accursed hot wind, when it blew, 
could not blow around so many corners as 
the old streets had. Nothing less than a 
whirlwind could wind and twist as those 
lanes wound and twisted. An intelligent 
traveler could scarcely find his way among 
them, with a plan of the town and a com- 
pass in his hand, and with the advantage 
of being able to ask for direction from 
time to time; so what could a mere visiting 
African hot wind do, without such assist- 
ance? 

Yes, the winding of the streets was de- 
lightful to them ; and you know that pecu- 
liar feeling, that thrill one has when one 
first gets into a country that is sympathetic? 
I can’t bring myself to talk about it very 
much, for it is a delicate spirit that takes 
34 


THE INTIMATE THING 


flight and is gone if you forget that at most 
you can but touch it lightly, intimately, and 
briefly; but I would find the words that 
strive (shame on the weak striving of 
words !) to convey that virginal sense of one 
city. 

And what is a city, pray? Is it the thou- 
sands of people whom you do not know, 
and the houses you do not enter? Or are 
its citizens for you the people whose hands 
you may touch, if you put out your hand? 

For Vincent and Gloria, the people who 
lived in the same house, in Calle Nohace- 
nada, interpreted Seville. 


35 


IV 

The Image 

Dolores, most winning inmate of the 
house in Seville, was one of those indolently 
plump Spanish women of thirty years, who, 
with softly complaining voices, say only 
pleasant things. A man had jilted her in 
order to marry a woman old enough to be 
his mother and rich enough to own a palace 
in the Plaza de la Magdalena. Now the 
forsaken one wore her trousseau with pleas- 
ure, and would explain, when anything she 
had on was admired, “It is a part of the 
trousseau Fuentes.” (Fuentes was the name 
of her faithless lover.) She was considered 
a very deep character and a well-read and 
serious woman. Her reading embraced the 
lives of the saints and authorized extracts 
from the Bible. Beyond that point a self- 
respecting Spanish woman’s serious reading 
may not extend. If she be able to read at 
all, is not that circumstance admirable 
enough? Shall her highly impressionable 
36 


THE IMAGE 


nature be exposed to all the radical sug- 
gestions of modern literature ? What should 
she gain that would not be a pitiful ex- 
change for this exquisite simplicity which is 
hers now, but which she would surely lose? 
Thus reasoned the priests, among whom she 
had friends; and each week she passed 
hours in seeing that the rooms of reverend 
persons were swept, dusted, and decorated 
with fresh flowers. She was an excellent 
pianist, but grieved because she had no voice 
for singing; therefore she had resorted to a 
delightful expedient. She recited, half 
singing, and accompanied herself on the 
piano. To watch her during this perform- 
ance made the chief pleasure of it ; the lift- 
ing of the eyebrows in questioning, and 
then the answer with a sad smile, showing 
the whiteness of her teeth, her breast heav- 
ing beneath the trousseau Fuentes. 

What a fool Fuentes was! 

In her boudoir Dolores had placed an 
image of the Virgin Mary on an altar, with 
a step where she might kneel. The altar 
was covered with pieces of rich satin and 
silk, and at the feet of the image lay peni- 
tential offerings of lace, ribbons, and jewels 
that she had especially liked to use in her 
37 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


own personal adornment; and there was 
also money, both banknotes and coins — 
these things all stained and bespattered with 
holy water. As she herself would explain, 
in such quaint English as she had picked up 
during a visit at Gibraltar: “These things 
I gif Maria (gave to the Virgin Mary) wen 
I mak-a the seen (when I committed a sin). 
Wong day I estriker my servangt. Then 
I sleep. Ing the middle of the night I hear 
plang! I cry to my servangt, ‘Rung, see 
wat fall!’ She fly; she come back; she 
tell-a me the altar ees all down, all een 
pieces. I put eet up again ; I gif Maria wong 
hunder pesetas ; I sprinkle, sprinkle all ofer 
weath holly water. ’ ’ 

Maria, the Blessed Lady, and unblest 
Dolores were two of the heroines of the 
household ; and another heroine’s name was 
Anita. 


38 


V 

Mr. Sullivan and Anita 

Mr. Sullivan was a young Irishman who 
had been sent from home to preach at the 
English Church in Seville during the winter 
months, and who found himself detained 
until June. He was obliged to wear the 
hat and habit of the society that sent him — 
the hat being low-crowned and wide- 
brimmed, not unlike those worn by Catho- 
lic priests in Spain. It appeared to be an 
imitation. His long frock-coat hung in 
folds about his lank figure, making him an 
overheated thing, at least a foot taller than 
mortal man. 

Although a source of amusement to the 
Spaniards, flouted in the streets as a ‘‘mock 
priest,” or an “English priest with a Cath- 
olic hat and a sweetheart,” Mr. Sullivan’s 
good humor was unfailing. Sometimes his 
genial spirit would even prompt him to 
return the soft answer, for he spoke a little 
39 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


Spanish with a rich brogue, and used his 
huge, thin hands in Spanish gestures — which 
made them look like fans that closed and 
hung toward the end of each remark. So 
he would stand at a loss and inwardly per- 
plexed, yet wagging his handsome black 
beard, and creasing his pink cheeks in con- 
ciliatory smiles. 

His congregation was restricted to tour- 
ists, few in number, and to the English 
residents, also few and perhaps a bit demor- 
alized; so in his plain room Mr. Sullivan 
found his only pleasure. And now even 
that peaceful retreat was to be invaded. 

From the neighboring village of Santo 
Ponce came Anita, a young girl who knew 
precisely as much about restraint or obliga- 
tion as she knew about sickness. She had 
heard that there were some people (she took 
it for granted that they must be oldish people) 
who were anxious about their manners and 
concerned about their health. As for her- 
self, she took no thought for either. She 
was absolutely healthy; she was equally 
natural in manner; an Andalusian hoyden 
who powdered her round face with care, 
while she put on her frock with negligence. 
Her eyes were black as her hair, otherwise 


40 


MR. SULLIVAN AND ANITA 


incomparable, and matchless, save that they 
matched each other; and a childish naughti- 
ness that lurked in them qualified her 
sparkling animation, and betrayed a brain 
overflowing with prankish suggestions. And 
behind this impulsiveness, this childishness, 
was assured self-approval. If Dolores, in 
whose care she was, reproved her for being 
forward in the presence of gentlemen, she 
would stare, then remember, then smile. 
That would be all; but the smile would 
ask, *‘Is it possible for a man to complain 
of a pretty young woman who dances the 
dance of Seville, sings the songs of Malaga, 
and opens her mouth to show how she can 
twist her red tongue between two rows of 
faultless teeth?” She always wore the 
mantilla in the street, with many flowers in 
her hair; in the house the least observant 
person was forced to notice that her dress, 
of one cool color, fitted her so snugly all 
over that here and there she appeared in 
place of the cloth. 

Upon one occasion Anita informed the 
household that her sister Miguela, at home 
in Santo Ponce, had ‘‘so many books” — 
indicating about an armful. 

“And Miguela had read them all,” she 
41 


Vengeance oe the female 

continued, looking steadily at her auditors. 
“Through,” she concluded impressively. 

“Wonderful!” said all the guests. 

“And Miguela writes beautifully,” recom- 
menced Anita. “Some of the most aristo- 
cratic ladies pay her for writing their love- 
letters. I wish you could see those letters. 
Not a blot! Notone! Eh?” 

“Wonderful!” all were obliged to re- 
peat. 

Miguela came to the house one day; re- 
ferred pleasantly to America as one of the 
British Isles; and in regard to her sister 
said, “You know Anita is not educated, 
but I believe she will have success because 
she is so handsome.” 

Now Anita straightway discovered that 
Mr. Sullivan was a nervous man, as he 
drank only tea. She accordingly jumped 
out on him from a dark corner when he 
came downstairs. Poor Mr. Sullivan was 
pretty well startled, but he only shook his 
forefinger at her, saying, “No, no, Anita. 
Es muy malo. (That’s very naughty.) 
Don’t you do that again.” 

Next she made a practice of joining him 
in the streets, which frightened him even 
more than dark corners, as the natives 


42 


MR. SULLIVAN AND ANITA 

entered into her joke and laughed with 
ostentatious laughter to see the ‘'English 
priest walking with a pretty woman.” 

“I have had a stroll with the pastor,” 
she would exclaim in an agony of mirth. 
“Dios! He told me to go away, and I 
made believe I could not understand. It 
was such fun!” 

One evening, about seven o’clock, she 
put on an English old lady’s bonnet and 
spectacles, took into her hand two small 
books from the table, and sent Cristina to 
tell el seflor pastor that one of his flock de- 
sired to speak with him. Mr. Sullivan was 
busy packing, for at last remittance and 
release had come ; so when he entered the 
drawing-room with a glad-to-see-you-but- 
please-go-soon manner, he naturally had 
something to say about his intended depar- 
ture, and Anita, as naturally, made that 
reference the occasion of a misunderstand- 
ing. 

“Yes, if you wish,” she said. “Certainly 
I shall go with you to Ireland.” 

‘ ‘ But it is far away to my country, ’ ’ stam- 
mered Mr. Sullivan. “It is very far; es muy 
lejos — lejos!” waving his hands in the air to 
indicate vast space and dreary remoteness. 

43 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


^‘Eh? Very far; muy lejos!” Anita re- 
peated. ‘‘Then I must make preparation. 
Let me go and get my things together to 
put in our trunks.” Waving her hands 
with his gesture, and murmuring, “To your 
country — muy lejos!” she darted out into 
the corridor. 

At that hour the house was very quiet. 
Dolores, in her room on the ground floor, 
was bathing away from her gentle face the 
pillow-marks left by an afternoon nap ; pat- 
ting the skin, which yet would not blush, 
with a wet towel; and then, more care- 
fully, while cheeks and throat were still 
damp, patting, patting again with a powder- 
puff. A moment of scrutiny, during which 
the mirror on her dressing-table reflected 
an expression not quite anxious, but more 
nearly resembling anxiety than could be 
noted on her face at other times; a ques- 
tion directed to her maid; a light flicking 
with a gauze handkerchief over the pow- 
dered surfaces; then it only remained to 
slip into a portion of the “trousseau Puen- 
tes,” and to be delicate in her favorite per- 
fumes and her choice mild melancholy at 
dinner, at the piano, leaning over the bal- 
cony, through the long evening — perhaps 


44 


A PATIO IN SEVITTE 
riie leaves of its plants were invitations. 












• « 







i:r 


MR. SULLIVAN AND ANITA 


through most of the night, which, in sum- 
mer, she treated as a starlit day, yet with 
privileges and the large leisure that belong 
to night. 

And so were others who lived in the 
house quietly engaged at that hour, in put- 
ting off the sluggishness that follows siesta 
and putting on evening dress. Doors 
leading to apartments and opening upon 
the corridors which surrounded the patio 
(gallery above gallery, corresponding with 
the stories of the building) were now 
thrown wide ; for the canvas awning which 
had been stretched over the court since sun- 
rise was at last rolled back, and a grateful 
breeze stole through, drawn in from the 
wide street portal and rising to the heated 
roof. The leaves of its plants were glossy 
invitations to enjoy the court, and to admire 
the well-washed marble pavement and the 
white corridors supported by columns which 
stood with precision like clean-limbed foot- 
men. 

So all was yawning quietness, appetite, 
and expectancy that would stir but would 
not hurry, when Anita darted out into the 
corridor and up two flights of stairs to her 
own little room, turning once and again to 
45 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


look down at poor Mr. Sullivan, who was 
watching her ascent with frightened eyes. 
At each turning she waved to him his own 
gesture, somehow making her little hands 
look like fans, too ; and with lips and eye- 
brows in dumb show, said: su pais — 

muy lejos: very far, eh? Oh, yes, I go 
with you.” Then she made motions that 
told of gathering dresses hastily together, 
throwing them into a trunk and trampling 
them flat. 

Then she disappeared. 

A moment later — she always did make 
things happen quickly — there was commo- 
tion in her room; a stifled scream, excite- 
ment reaching to the street. Next the guests 
heard steps short and quick on the pave- 
ment before the front door, and a sharp, 
peremptory ringing of the door-bell. 

Now the street door stood wide open, 
and only a screen of ornamental ironwork 
intervened between the court and the out- 
side world. Through this screen was visible 
the figure of a man who had his hand on 
the bell-handle still, ready to ring again; 
and from the opposite corridor Cristina 
looked him over curiously before she called 
out, “Quien?” (Who is it?) 

46 


MR. SULLIVAN AND ANITA 


If he had replied with the customary ^‘It 
is I,” or “It is the Sefior So-and-so, “ 
Cristina would have let the iron screen 
swing open. She had only to pull a knob, 
which would pull a wire, which would pull 
a spring-bolt — a very simple contrivance 
that spares the servants much running to 
the door and back. But this young man 
began irregularly. 

“I want to speak to the master or mis- 
tress of this house,” he cried. “Be- 
cause — ’ ’ 

Cristina withdrew her hand from the 
knob and let him stand outside. “What 
does your grace desire?” she asked, resting 
her elbows on the corridor railing, and set- 
tling herself in conversational attitude. 

The ensuing dialogue was household 
property, of course, the speakers being so 
far apart. Curious heads were thrust out 
into the corridors to catch a glimpse of this 
stranger. A little social spasm occurred. 
Indolent preparation for dinner was trans- 
formed into twitching excitement. 

Evidently the man knew that every one 
was listening. “In my person,” he contin- 
ued, “you see a gentleman who has influ- 
ence with the chief judge of this city, who 
47 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


is also much of a gentleman {inuy caballerd). 
And I have been insulted by some person 
in this house.” 

“But — what does your grace desire?” 
Cristina repeated, suavely. 

“As I pass by your house — there, at the 
side, just now — water is thrown upon me! 
My new hat — ’ ’ 

(Cristina sympathetically changed her at- 
titude.) 

“ — for which I paid twelve and a half 
pesetas only yesterday — eh? You may ask 
in Sierpes Street, number ninety-four. 
There you will learn the price of the hat. 
Now I have sent for the sereno,** 

A ripple of half-suppressed laughter 
passed around the corridors when he men- 
tioned the sereno^ for serenos are droll 
night-watchmen, with mediaeval equipment 
of spear, lantern and double-breasted cape. 
Apparently there was sport to be had with 
this tall young man ; he might show pretty 
tricks if put to it. The household was 
drawn from its apartments, formed cheerful 
groups of three or four in each gallery, 
leaned upon the railings, and began to chaff 
according to ability — but only to prove 
once more that Spanish chaff has too much 

48 


MR. SULLIVAN AND ANITA 


of ridicule in it, and too little of concilia- 
tion. The young man stood his ground; 
grew quiet and almost white with angry 
resolution ; waited for the sereno. 

Now, when the latter came he very po- 
litely explained that there actually was a 
city ordinance providing for the severe 
punishment of any person who threw from 
the window (so the sereno put it) “anything 
whatever, in itself harmless, in such a man- 
ner as to damage the passers-by.” Such 
the unforeseen conclusion. Then discom- 
fiture in the corridors, triumph at the door. 

Anita had been gradually making her way 
downstairs — shyly for her, without a word 
for anyone, or even a jest for Mr. Sullivan; 
and when the young man, with a threat to 
invoke the law, was on the point of going 
away, she walked quickly to the door and 
stood there, looking at him. Nothing 
theatrical — no pose; just easily and gra- 
ciously she said: “I was on my balcony 
watering my pinks. Will you have one? 
I spilled a little water that fell on you. 
What will you do to me?” 

“Nothing!” with a quick, deprecating 
gesture, said the stranger. ‘ ‘ I kiss your feet, 
seftorita!” 


49 


VI 

A Maid 

Christina — but she must be spelled with- 
out the h in the Spanish style — Cristina 
pronounced her name with an accompanying 
wave of the right hand, the forefinger and 
thumb being held so as to form an O. So 
please call her roundly, Crees-tee-nah. 

She was small and slight, but not thin. 
She was dignified, and altogether Spanish at 
heart; she was sympathetic in appearance 
and manner, and beyond all question she 
was refined. Her parents kept her strictly 
guarded. Each day her mother or brother 
attended her in the street when she came to 
the house in the morning or went away in 
the evening. 

Just one little story about her; and to 
preface it one needs only to say that there 
were balconies over the street, as there were 
corridors on the patio ; and that during the 
summer long curtains falling from the tops 
of the windows and held out by the railing 
made these balconies so many cool spots 

50 


A MAID 


where Cristina could sit at her sewing. Now, 
she became so wedded to a particular bal- 
cony, and so passionately attached to sewing, 
that one might have been at a loss to explain 
such a marked preference and such industry. 

One might have been at a loss before 
noticing that the balcony in question almost 
adjoined another, similarly shaded, project- 
ing from the neighbor’s house. Then 
indeed her conduct became more explicable ; 
and one day a perfect explanation drifted in 
to Dolores, where she was sitting, nodding 
in a darkened room — these fragments of 
amorous talk drifting in to her: 

A man’s voice: Where were you yes- 
terday, seftorita, and what were you doing?” 

Cristina: ”It was too warm to do any- 
thing.” She had been folding and packing 
a part of the ” trousseau Fuentes” for Do- 
lores all day long. 

The man: ‘‘You were reading, perhaps?” 

Cristina (archly): ‘‘Perhaps.” She did 
not know how to read. 

The man: ‘‘Did you ever read a story 
called “Pepita,” by Juan Valera? You 
remind me so much of the heroines in all 
the romances. But your eyes are finer 
than theirs could have been.” 

51 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


Cristina: “You are joking.” 

The man: “On the contrary, I never 
jest. Have I not told you that I am of a 
serious disposition? Am I not studying 
the law — a most serious profession? Believe 
me when I say that your eyes are to me the 
finest in the world.” 

Cristina: “I am sorry for the town you 
come from if the young women are not bet- 
ter to look at.” 

The man: “But they are famously hand- 
some, and especially known for their beau- 
tiful eyes.” 

So, then, it was in this manner that 
Cristina passed her time on the balcony. 
When asked to whom she was talking, she 
demurely answered that it was to the gen- 
tleman next door, who was a student at the 
law school of Seville, and very lonely in 
the city, as he had no friends. 

Although his plight was such a sad one, 
it seemed to Dolores advisable to remove 
Cristina two balconies beyond his reach, 
and to forbid conversation. This measure, 
however, apparently stimulated rather than 
discouraged him; and not long afterward 
he began to invite her further attention by 
reading in a loud voice beautiful verses, in 


52 


A MAID 


which she was declared to be the light 
whence the sun steals his glory, and again 
a loveliest dove bereft of liberty {Jicrmosis- 
ima paloma privada de liberiad). Presently, 
when he tendered to her a serenade before 
dark, with guitar and postures, Dolores 
felt constrained to appear upon the balcony 
and to inform him that her maid could not 
take the time from her work to listen to 
conversation, poetry, or music. 

He was horribly fascinated and dumb. 

As Dolores was about to withdraw, he 
made a gesture of appeal, straining forward 
and upward with arms and moody dark face, 
crying: 

‘‘Madam — Miss. Your maid? Excuse 
me, did you say your maid?'" 

“Certainly. Yes, sir.” 

‘ ‘ I beg your pardon, ’ ’ — pathetically. He 
disappeared then, and the household never 
saw him again. 


53 


VII 

The Other Dolores 

Just at the beginning of summer Seville 
is a Paradise in which the light air is still 
full of the fragrance of orange blossoms; 
a marvel then, with its delicious gardens 
and shady patios, its hot afternoons for 
sleep, and its cool nights for pleasures and 
business. Awnings, stretched above, from 
housetop to housetop, shade its streets; and 
thus, as though the whole city had been 
drawn together under a single roof, all good 
citizens allow themselves a familiar and 
homelike negligence. Formality and the 
formal usages of society die on Corpus 
Christi evening, when all the shipping in 
the river is illuminated, and so is the Tower 
of Gold, and so the Triana bridge ; and when 
gay crowds on the promenade and the quay 
flutter and chatter in a scene from fairyland — 
quite illusive, unless it be objected that 
many of the female fairies are inclined to be 
fat. That is the last effort society makes 
54 


THE OTHER DOLORES 


to wear good clothing. That is the begin- 
ning of summer. Immediately after Corpus 
society gets ready to go away to the seaside, 
or puts on a linen gown once for all, and in 
darkened rooms begins its summer-long 
occupation of holding open the linen gown 
with the left hand and fanning its indolent, 
plump neck with the right. 

During the warm weather, after coffee in 
the morning, some of the household would 
go to walk very early, so as to be in before 
ten o’clock, when the real heat of the day 
began ; and when they returned from these 
early walks they were always glad to rest in 
the court where a fountain plashed forever, 
and the sun never came. Then some- 
times Cristina would be told to bring her 
castanets and dance a few figures of the 
seguidilla (or as they called it there, the 
Sevillana), which she would do with easy 
perfection and a little body all full of con- 
scious grace. Such countless creeping steps 
her feet would take, while from the hips 
she was swaying, and while her arms were 
making long, languid, sweeping curves 
above her head ; and then the click-clicking 
of little wooden disks to inspirit, and that 
gay music of the dance which sounds as 
55 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


though it were in advance of the steps and 
yet with them! 

One morning Cristina was dancing to 
give pleasure to General Cordoba, who sat 
with Manuela, Feliciana, and Gracia. 

**What dance like the Sevillana to make 
eyes sparkle and the blood course through 
the veins?” the general was saying. “How 
Cristina shows her little feet, but how dis- 
creetly, as her skirts sway in the short 
steps ; with what an air she lifts her head 
when the arm forms a semi-circle in front of 
her face; what triumph at the end of a 
copla her small figure expresses as she strikes 
an attitude, with the long ribbons hanging 
down from the castanets.” 

Manuela and Feliciana and Gracia had 
been ejaculating, envying, and trying to 
learn. “How did she take that step now? 
Would she - explain it? ” Yes, Cristina 
would explain it ; she lifted her skirt and 
repeated the step so rapidly that one had 
less idea of it than before — a result which 
pleased her; and when accused of not wish- 
ing to reveal her art, she laughed and made 
in rapid succession a number of peculiar 
little sounds with the tongue against the 
roof of the mouth and the teeth, emphasiz- 
56 


THE OTHER DOLORES 


ing this amiable negation by shaking her 
forefinger. 

While this was going on Mr. Taswell 
Langdon came in from the street, bringing 
with him the man who, as a stranger at the 
door (with his new hat drenched), had made 
the little sensation a few days before. 
Langdon evidently intended to take him 
upstairs to his own room, but the dance was 
too strong an attraction ; the two men hesi- 
tated for a moment, then Langdon went for- 
ward to ask General Cordoba’s permission ; 
then beckoned to his companion, and a 
formal introduction took place — to the gen- 
eral and to the general’s three daughters. 

“It’s lucky I’ve brought Dr. Lejero, ’’ 
said Mr. Langdon in faulty Spanish, “for 
he’s no doubt a judge of the seguidilla; 
perhaps he dances it himself.’’ 

Dr. Lejero availed himself of this open- 
ing, and began to entertain the three 
daughters, while Langdon explained to 
General Cordoba that he had met the young 
man at the club and had taken a fancy to 
him. He was such an entertaining fellow — 
this Lejero — and so quick-witted. That 
had probably been just a trick of his, Mr. 
Langdon thought, to have a word with 
57 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


Anita, when he caught sight of her on her 
balcony and made a row about his wet hat. 

The dance had been started up again, 
after the introductions, and all of the little 
group applauded Cristina’s steps and made 
merry. 

Then, inopportunely, as it seemed (unless 
Lejero’s coming brought this to pass), the 
chief woman of Spain was manifested. 

For by slight degrees the interest in Cris- 
tina’s dancing flagged ; a sedative influence, 
that yet was not oppressive, seemed to con- 
trol the gay spirits and to be felt by Cris- 
tina herself. Dr. Lejero said afterward 
that it was as though one had been dream- 
ing of revelry and had awakened in a church. 
Presently he — Dr. Lejero — drew attention 
to himself by the strange expression of his 
face and by his reverential attitude. He 
was looking at some object on the farther 
side of the patio, and the others, following 
the direction of his eyes, saw a woman 
going along under the arch of the corridor 
to a door, through which she passed into 
Dolores’s apartment. The woman looked 
toward them, before she disappeared, with 
eyes that were kind, but without personal 
recognition — as though observing from some 


THE OTHER DOLORES 

remote place and unconscious of being vis- 
ible. 

‘‘The Virgin Mary,” said Lejero, and he 
made the sign of the cross. 

“That’s Dolores,” said Feliciana, and 
laughed, but rather nervously. 

“I don’t think that woman was like Do- 
lores,” said the general. 

“But it must have been,” cried Manuela. 

“No,” said the general; and he, too, 
made the sign of the cross. 

Mr. Langdon would have liked to cross 
himself, if only to show that he was not a 
mere spectator. He had the Protestant 
feeling of shame, as though he had unwit- 
tingly come upon people at their private 
devotions. 


59 


VIII 

The Cordoba Family 

The people of the household thought 
themselves fortunate in that they lived on 
terms of intimacy with the Cordoba family. 

General Cordoba, the father, showed at a 
glance that he went into good society, being 
better dressed than his three daughters, and 
having a certain manner — deliberate, quietly 
expressive, almost majestic. When his 
family had accepted an invitation from 
some friend, one seldom failed to notice 
that, while excessively polite. General Cor- 
doba was conscious of doing a favor by his 
mere presence, and that an occasional gleam 
in his eye corresponded with the unspoken 
suggestion that he would shortly be getting 
away to his club. He was sure to be the 
center of attention, and even during the 
visit his daughters made much of him. A 
tall and handsome man he was, attesting 
the success of his military career by the cor- 
rectness of his bearing, the turn of his head, 

6o 


THE CORDOBA FAMILY 


and the soldierly cut of his scrupulously 
buttoned coat. A darker hue had been 
laid upon his florid complexion by the sun, 
during his campaign in the Philippines. 

The oldest daughter, Manuela, was almost 
plain and rather subdued. Evidently she 
was thought, by herself and the others, to 
be not only the oldest, but positively old. 
Her age was twenty-four. 

The second daughter, Feliciana, an 
attractive widow of twenty-one, with a son 
of four summers, had none of the ways of 
a married woman. But that was natural 
enough; her little episode was not an un- 
common one. There had been a young 
man who looked very well in his only suit 
of clothes; who stood in the narrow street 
beneath her window throughout the day, 
to show that he scorned work and lived only 
for a glance of her dear eyes; i^rho was not 
allowed to enter the house, but each even- 
ing plucked the pea-hen,” as their phrase 
is, at the lower iron-barred window, plucking 
away, one by one, all her feathers of reserve 
and concealment, in spite of the iron bars 
that kept them physically apart (or perhaps 
one should say, with the aid of iron bars, 
for it is physical insecurity that makes spir- 

6i 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


itual reserve) ; who then took her away, and 
proved that bread and onions shared with 
her were enough — for a fortnight ; who at 
the end of the second week brought her 
back to her home, and who then died. 
Feliciana continued to be a young girl, 
going out with papa and sisters. 

Gracia, the youngest daughter, was 
pretty. The Cordoba family looked upon 
her as their beauty, and she was expected 
to achieve great things — perhaps a rich 
Cuban or a ^‘really nice Englishman.” 
The latter sort, they all three conversation- 
ally assured Dolores, existed sometimes, as 
but two years before they had known such 
a fine fellow. He never ”wore clothes like 
horses” — no! And he had been equally 
attentive to all three, they said ; but Gracia 
whined in speaking of him, and insisted 
that every boat coming into the port of 
Seville during her afternoon strolls on the 
quay was an English boat, and fancied she 
saw the ”J union Acky” (Union Jack) 
waving from her stern. 

These girls gave their time and thought 
to their father, in their desire to make him 
utterly comfortable, economizing in every 
other direction, so that there should be 
62 


THE CORDOBA FAMILY 


enough money for him and for his club and 
for his clothes; but they also hid their self- 
sacrifice, or confessed it only in the slight- 
ness of their neat figures. They spoke in 
low tones, with frequent gestures of hand 
and fan. Once a week they went to the 
Paseo, the riverside park of Seville, where 
Society drives, rides, or walks. • Three little 
martyrs, they went only on Thursdays — 
^Hor their father feared they would become 
too well known if he took them more fre- 
quently, ” they said. The general went 
every day. 

But it is a comfort to know a few martyrs 
personally, in order to see that their lives 
are not solid misery. These sweet martyrs 
took their daily walk, always accompanied 
by a maid. Their way led through public 
gardens, where they could see many people 
who were going to the Paseo ; past the bar- 
racks, from which the officers called out 
complimentary phrases, and down along the 
stone quay — with idle ships in line and uni- 
formed commanders on deck, under white 
awnings. Then, as the martyrs lifted their 
skirts daintily over the ever-moist paving- 
stones, what hearty appreciation! 

Once, especially, a bluff commander, 
63 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


sitting with his officers and friends drinking 
aguardiente in the cool air of the late after- 
noon, arose and stepped to the railing and 
saluted them, and said: “At your feet, 
young ladies. Accept my compliments, 
for you have the prettiest feet I have seen 
in all the ports of the world — having in 
mind Manila and Havana and San Juan de 
Puerto Rico, at the very least. ’ ’ Whereupon 
the other men clapped their hands and 
cried, “Hail, Andalusia.” The martyrs 
did not look up, of course, but remarked, 
one to the others, “What insolence!” and 
declared it would be their last walk in that 
quarter. So, on the following day, all three 
were there at the same hour; and in addi- 
tion to the maid they had brought a friend. 
And Gracia (she of the most marvellous 
feet) said to Feliciana, as they peered cau- 
tiously about, “That boat is gone.” 

“Which boat?” the friend asked. 

“Where some silly men were yesterday. 
I am so relieved.” 

“And I also,” said Feliciana. 

“And I also,” said Manuela. 


64 


IX 


Dr. Lejero as the New Friend of the 
Cordoba Family 

General Cordoba belonged to that small 
class of Spaniards who strongly disapprove 
of the bull-fight. ‘'It is an amusement fit 
for savages,” he declared; and his daugh- 
ters were forbidden to speak in praise of the 
sport. Occasionally, however, some of 
their relations would take them, for the 
charm of having such naive spectators as 
companions. “Do you remember, Gracia, 
how well Pepita Morales put those flowers 
in my hair, the day we went with our 
cousin to the fight?” you would hear Feli- 
ciana ask, months after such a grand occa- 
sion. “Yes, indeed,” Gracia would reply; 
“and what a fine bull the third one was. 
He killed twelve horses, and I held my 
gauze fan up before my face all through it, 
and the man in the seat in front of me 
thought I was crying — when he saw the 
pearl spangles on my fan — and nearly cried 
in sympathy.” 


65 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


One afternoon, when Lejero was at the 
house talking with the Cordoba family and 
Vincent and Gloria, the cousin to whom 
Feliciana had referred came in. He wanted 
to see Mr. Langdon, but stopped to greet 
his uncle and cousins most politely, and 
Gracia accompanied him to the foot of the 
staircase. 

“Eh, Pepe, ” she asked, “are you going 
to the fight to-morrow?” 

“Yes, indeed,” was his answer. 

“Ah, Pepito,” she sighed, “how I envy 
you.” 

“What is that you say, Gracia?” the 
general interposed from the distance. 

“I was only saying what fearful affairs 
those bull-fights are, and how many poor 
horses will be killed to-morrow.” 

“Ah, my dear, you are quite right,” said 
the general. “It is monstrous.” 

Now, Lejero was a passionate lover of 
bull-fights, and would even travel to Madrid 
and Port St. Mary to see them — indeed, 
he was not always content to be a mere 
spectator; so he was plainly irritated by 
General Cordoba’s views. Gentle little 
Manuela guessed the cause of his vexation, 
and tactfully made for him an opportunity 
66 


DR. LEJERO 


to speak in defense of his favorite pastime. 
“I know so little about it all,” she said 
plaintively to the guest. “I wish you 
would tell me who are the prominent bull- 
fighters. Can you make me a list of their 
names, in the order of excellence?” 

Dr. Lejero had been sitting on the edge 
of his chair; in his mouth a cigarette, bent 
almost double, so that the lighted end 
threatened to burn his beard. This request 
brought him to his feet. ”You want them 
written down?” he asked, with emotion in 
every other feature and an upward jerk of 
the curled cigarette. “Wait” — opening 
out one hand as though to ward off the 
Cordoba family. He stepped to the writ- 
ing-desk and helped himself to pencil and 
paper, allowing no assistance and evidently 
fearing interruption of his train of thought. 
With the right forearm on the desk, ready 
to begin the list, with head thrown back, 
the forefinger of the left hand pressed to the 
brow, he sat for an instant; then a quick 
circular movement of the pencil and a vigor- 
ous thrusting out of it as he uttered the 
name “Mazantini,” with a smile of triumph. 
“The king of fighters,” he added, and 
wrote it down. 


67 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


'‘And he is handsome?” Manuela sug- 
gested. 

‘ ‘ I should think so, ’ ’ Lejero said. “How 
he stands in the arena” — himself standing 
and waving his hand outward from the 
chest; “and the grace of that mighty arm 
in carrying the capa ' — holding an imagi- 
nary cloak on his arm in imitation of Mazan- 
tini. And so he went on to the end of the 
list, naming the great “first swords,” and 
showing by a gesture or two not only the 
principal characteristics of each man, but 
his own strong points, as though by inad- 
vertence.* 

And now it was General Cordoba’s turn 
to feel irritation. Too courteous to tell 
Lejero that he was but proving himself to 
be a savage by his enthusiasm for the bull- 
fight, he resolved that he would say exactly 
those words to Manuela and Feliciana and 
Gracia when their guest had departed ; and 
meantime he tried to lead the conversation 
back to the subject they had been discussing 
before Pepe came in. “You were right, no 
doubt,” he said, “when you maintained 
just now that the Holy Virgin really has 

*A note on bull-fighting by Mr. Langdon is given 
at the end of the volume. 

68 


DR. LEJERO 


more power in these days than in any previ- 
ous age. To our feminized civilization she 
is a suitable and an appropriate divinity, 
just as — well, just as Wotan and Thor were 
appropriate and suitable divinities for rough 
and virile Scandinavians. And inasmuch 
as her power is rapidly increasing, it seems 
logical to expect new manifestations of it — 
manifestations that may even shock us at 
first, because they seem miraculous and super- 
natural, for the very simple reason that they 
are part of a new order of things. But of 
course when it comes to mistaking Dolores 
for the Holy Virgin — ” 

‘*You thought so yourself,” said Lejero, 
quite hotly. 

“Yes, for a moment,” replied the gen- 
eral. “It was certainly a very strange 
illusion, and I never had such a feeling 
before ; but as against the evidence of 
Dolores herself, you know — ’ ’ 

“No, I don’t quite know!” said Lejero. 
“Tm not sure what I ought to think; but 
one thing is absolutely clear, and that is that 
the Virgin is more real, as a person, than any 
mere woman of Spain. It should not be re- 
garded as strange if we see her ; it would be 
strange indeed if we should never see her.” 

69 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


There was silence for a moment, during 
which this consideration was permitted to 
sink into the minds of all. 

And Gloria, with her hands folded in her 
lap, had this vision : It seemed to her that 
the Virgin Mary had become a visible par- 
ticipant in the affairs of the people of the 
city; that she led by the hand a veiled 
woman who had laid her baby in the public 
cradle (you remember); that, neither more 
nor less exclusive than was Christ when He 
lived on this earth, she drew near to all 
sorts of people, in sympathy — and that the 
people were more drawn toward her be- 
cause she was a woman and altogether 
human; that especially the gentle and sim- 
ple-hearted were in her care, so that 
Dolores’s devotions were offered less fre- 
quently to the image in her room than to 
the ever-living Mary in person. 

Lejero continued: ^‘I have been talking 
it over with the American, Mr. Langdon, 
who is such a famous scholar. He says my 
idea about the Virgin is half true — and the 
true part is terribly serious. And he has 
given me a story to read that shows how 


70 


DR. LEJERO 


the power of the Holy Virgin began and 
how it has been growing. It is worth 
listening to. Now I shall tell it.” 

And he did tell it. 

We have not had a chance to describe 
Dr. Lejero yet, and so it would perhaps do 
no good to speak about his manner of re- 
citing this story — with the flame of Spanish 
eloquence that swept in a few minutes, it 
seemed, from the beginning to the end of it. 

It will seem longer in the reading, and 
yet it should be read rapidly, if at all; so 
let it stand in a chapter by itself. 


71 


X 


Mr. Langdon’s Story, ‘‘Vengeance of 
the Female,*’ as Told by Lejero 

Well, there was an old room, and an old 
mechanic, with a mechanic’s wonder-work- 
ing hands and a thoughtful face. 

It was a shop for mechanical toys, and 
the largest toy of all represented the solar 
system. On a very grand scale indeed was 
this toy. It was much larger than you can 
possibly imagine, and it was complete in 
every particular. Even figures representing 
the creatures living on some of the planets 
were there. 

The good maker of mechanical toys had 
just finished the population of a moon. 

“This is well,’’ said he, but without 
enthusiasm. 

Then, after a short pause (which to the 
inhabitants of the moon would have seemed 
a matter of a thousand years or so), he con- 
tinued, “These toy beings are perfect.’’ 
There was another pause, in which another 

72 


MR. LANGDON'S STORY 


thousand years elapsed. The maker of 
mechanical toys yawned. “These toys are 
too perfect for my taste,” he said. “They 
don’t change. From the beginning they 
have always the same perfection ; that is tire- 
some!” 

He nodded, slept; ages passed. He 
awoke, and still was bored. Meanwhile the 
toys in that moon had crumbled into dust. 

“Now,” said the mechanic, “suppose I 
make some toys that are imperfect, and give 
them the impulse to perfect themselves; 
and then watch them while among them- 
selves they work it out.” 

He leaned his great mild- featured face 
upon his hands; then closed his eyes and 
covered them with his fingers, to shut out 
the sight of multitudes of toys which he had 
made on a different plan — toys that were 
all perfect and tiresome. The mechanic 
thought. Darkness was upon the face of 
the deep, and the little Earth was without 
form. 

The mechanic’s thought moved upon the 
face of the waters of the Earth, so that life 
began; and the continents appeared, and 
the Earth for a moment (to the creatures 
upon the Earth it seemed thousands of 
73 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


years) was the busiest spot in all the work- 
shop. For he made a great number of 
toys and a great variety ; and, because they 
were constantly changing, he became more 
and more interested in his work among them. 

“I might make a collection of the best of 
these to keep for my own pleasure always,” 
he said, when putting the finishing touches 
on the pouch of a toy kangaroo and begin- 
ning to model the skull of a toy ape. But 
presently he found himself studying a few 
mechanical toys which were so cleverly con- 
trived that they seemed at first sight to be 
quite distinct from all the rest, although 
they were really no more than a slight im- 
provement upon many others that he had 
made. For example, they stood on their 
hind legs, yet could walk, run, and leap with 
ease. The fore legs were thus free to be 
put to other uses, and were made so that 
they could deal a blow or throw a stone with 
force and accuracy. More than all the 
other toys they had caught the spirit of 
the mechanic’s plan. They moved easily 
and quickly in obedience to his thought — so 
easily, indeed, that sometimes they seemed 
to have anticipated it. ”They are almost 
independent,” their maker said ; ”just a lit- 
74 


MR. LANGDON’S STORY 


tie more thought, and they can go on by 
themselves.” 

Folding his hands, he watched them, and 
two of the remarkable toys enacted a little 
tragedy so naturally that it seemed to be of 
their free will. 

A male toy of the highest class ap- 
proached a female of the same pattern. 
They were both shaggy toys, almost cov- 
ered with hair; their shoulders slouching 
forward and their sinewy arms hanging away 
from the body, as though they were on the 
point of dropping on all-fours. A fierce 
struggle followed. The male and female 
were evenly matched, for while the fe- 
male was perhaps a bit heavier, the male 
excelled in masterful purpose. With one 
accord they clinched and wrestled, straining 
until their very bones seemed to bend ; 
presently, falling sidewise together, they 
rolled over and over upon the ground, tear- 
ing each other with teeth and nails, yelling, 
snarling — at last but gasping. And the 
male triumphed. 

The female submitted to the male while 
he was with her, but smote her breast and 
tore her tough flesh when alone. And the 
mechanic saw far into the future when he 


75 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 

perceived in her savage, narrow, and heavy- 
lidded eyes a gleam that seemed like the 
promise of immortal hatred. Yet she con- 
tinued to live in subjection, serving the 
male in all ways for his comfort and pleas- 
ure; in terror when he was near, with 
detestation when he was absent. 

*‘This will be the beginning of a fine 
plot,” the mechanic said, ”in the story of 
this toy race: just the working out of this 
conquest by the male, and all the different 
ways in which the female will be avenged. 
There will be nothing else of real impor- 
tance. All the other happenings will be, in 
one way or another, comparatively slight 
consequences of this struggle. Well, the 
Earth-toys are a promising lot, so I shall 
keep on working at them for a while.” 

And this decision was justified by a near 
event ; for as the mechanic watched he saw 
a change taking place in the female. 
Monotonous fear and hate occasionally 
made way for a new expression. The female 
at intervals became pensive, conscious of a 
new life within her. At such times her 
cruel eyes became almost tender, and, if 
her master was near, her submission to him 
seemed to be almost willing. 

76 


MR. LANGDON’S STORY 


Fitful showing of another nature, and of 
short duration. Soon a smaller and finer 
image of herself was laid upon her breast; 
but she pushed it aside, and, glaring into the 
face of the male who was leaning over her, 
struck him with such force that he staggered 
jp backward. Then her mechanism was 
broken, and she did not stir again. She 
was thrown aside, and finally her material 
entered into the composition of other toys. 
She was more than replaced by the little 
new toy — a female also, but somewhat 
smoother than the broken one. The me- 
chanic, however, saw in this successor the 
same threat of undying hate. 

As time went on, mechanical toys of this 
particular pattern received more and more at- 
tention from the mechanic, and were greatly 
improved, both in appearance and in the 
complexity of their mechanism. It was 
no longer true of them that they merely 
responded to their maker’s thought. No; 
they actually thought for themselves, more 
or less, and their superiority to all the other 
toys became so marked that the mechanic 
decided to make the experiment of putting 
them in charge, and letting them carry out 
his plans with respect to inferior toys. He 
77 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 

accordingly enclosed a part of the Earth 
and arranged it like a beautiful garden ; and, 
to make the experiment on a safely small 
scale, he chose only one male specimen — 
the most advanced of all — and one pair each 
of various inferior toys, taking care that the 
latter should be the most docile of their 
kind. These he placed in the garden under 
the leadership of the superior male, whom 
he called “toy-man,” the inferiors being 
called “toy-animals.” 

The man proved himself to be easily first 
in the garden. But he had scarcely begun 
to feel at home there before he demanded a 
female of his own class. The mechanic 
complied, indeed, but tried to avert the 
danger he foresaw by making a female of 
the very latest pattern, the man’s equal in 
most respects. Moreover, he took part of 
the man-toy’s mechanism to use in con- 
structing the female, so that the old hatred 
might be less strong — so that the female 
might be like unto the male in nature. 

This female, when she was completed and 
placed in the garden, he called “Woman.” 
And truly it did seem at first that love of 
the man had been engrafted upon her; but 
at length this apparent love was shown to 
78 


MR. LANGDON’S STORY 


be only hatred in a more subtle and dan- 
gerous form. 

So sweet were this woman’s words that it 
seemed she caressed them as they formed 
themselves in her mind, and then kissed 
them as they fluttered out between her red 
lips. She was somewhat lower than the 
man, and somewhat, though not conspicu- 
ously, his inferior in physical strength. 
Compared with the original female of her 
species, the differences were chiefly in the 
smoothness of her skin, which had lost 
the covering of hair, in erectness of carriage, 
in the roundness of her limbs and the grace 
of her movements. 

Now, this garden was an interesting place 
for the man, because he had his duties and 
the flattering sense of power, but to the 
woman it was dull. She was only a sort of 
inferior animal in her man’s eyes. She 
knew herself to be attractive, yet was lim- 
ited to a single admirer, who soon took her 
presence as a mere matter of course. She 
had her little troubles, but no one of her own 
sex to sympathize with her; nor was there 
a smirking auditor for her flood of small 
talk, which stagnated, and so oppressed her, 
pent up within her breast. In one word, 
79 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


she longed for society — smooth - skinned 
society at any cost. 

But society was to be found only outside 
the garden ; therefore escape from the garden, 
at any cost, was her aim. If she could only 
discredit the man in the mechanic’s opinion, 
expulsion for him and escape for her! 

She did not know the delights of society 
from experience, but by dint of questioning 
she had drawn from the man all that he 
knew in regard to the outside world. Such 
fragments of information had been joined 
together by her imagination, and the mosaic 
thus formed her ardent desire had colored 
with the brightest hues. She firmly believed 
it a true representation of the world. As 
for the man, he had partly forgotten the 
hardship, toil, and bitter strife from which 
he had been rescued; and in the security of 
the garden his thoughts, when they went 
back to that former life, busied themselves 
chiefly with its rare but excessive pleasures. 
So when j:hey walked together in the gar- 
den, toward evening, she would lean upon 
his shoulder and pour into his ear sweet 
poison — such glowing descriptions, such tan- 
talizing vistas of enjoyment, such madden- 
ing assurance of infinitely varied delights! 

8o 


MR. LANGDON’S STORY 


One evening she had taken his senses 
captive, and like an eager child he begged 
her to go on, whenever she paused in her 
dear story. And then the knowledge of 
good and evil — of the world beyond the 
garden — seemed to both of them as a 
luscious fruit to one dying of hunger and 
thirst. 

In the morning the man said: ‘‘Well, 
then, let it be as you wish, and not as He 
willed who made this garden; let us taste 
both good and evil. And tell me how it is 
that you know more than I, although you 
have seen less.” 

The woman laughed. Near by a serpent 
lay warming itself in the sunlight. “One 
of those things coiled about my neck and 
whispered in my ear,” she said mockingly. 

Then the mechanic took them both up 
between his thumb and forefinger, and set 
them outside the garden ; and he passed his 
hand over the garden to destroy it, for the 
experiment was a failure. The woman had 
not been made like unto the man in nature — 
not enough like her old enemy to forget 
that he was her old enemy. And so that 
antagonism had wrought their downfall. 

Now, thousands of years (as men and 
Si 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


women, laboring and heavy-laden, reckoned 
time) passed away before the mechanic 
would again put his hand to the work of 
further improvement in the very compli- 
cated structure of these mechanical toys. 
It did not seem a long time to him. Mean- 
while the race of men and women went of 
their own accord ^Ho the devil,” as the say- 
ing is. They did literally imagine a devil — 
multitudes of devils — and made these devils 
chargeable with their misfortunes. And 
women had become much more unlike men, 
having gradually adapted themselves to a 
sheltered existence, to men’s demand for 
pleasures and diversions, and to the servi- 
tude of home and family. The women, 
especially, believed in devils, and sought to 
protect themselves from the harm of devils 
by propitiating them. So devil-worship 
was the beginning of their religion. 

Their devils were more and more exalted, 
until people came to make a distinction, 
calling the more excellent devils by a new 
name — gods. Finally some of these gods 
were believed to be no longer evil, but actu- 
ally good ; and these good gods were 
implored to take in hand mechanical toys 
and toy-society generally, and to put their 
82 


MR. LANGDON’S STORY 


disordered mechanism to rights. Those 
who offered such petitions unwittingly 
appealed to the good mechanic, who there- 
upon gave his attention to them once more. 

‘^The trouble all grows out of the old 
male-female feud,” said the mechanic to 
himself; ‘‘and the only way to help them is 
to get rid of the difference in their natures, 
so far as possible. Well, I have tried mak- 
ing the women like the men ; now suppose 
I make the men more like the women.” 
Then he decided to impart still more of his 
thought to the toys, and to work among 
them. But instead of teaching and work- 
ing in person, he chose to work through a 
few individuals whom he prompted and 
advised. 

One of the individuals thus distinguished 
was a woman named Mary. He filled her 
with his own spirit and with the especial 
purpose he had in mind, so that kind acts, 
sweet words, and gentle thoughts made up 
her whole life. And when she bore a son, 
that child was quite unlike other children, 
for he had the serenity and sweetness of his 
mother, and a great purpose, also received 
from her, lifting his life above small cares, 
ambitions, and contentions. So the people 
83 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


who saw him said he must be a child of their 
god, and their vulgarity pictured a miracle 
in gross coloring. 

He had Mary’s nature, with scarce a trace 
of his father; and so the opportunity came 
for the woman’s plan. 

Mary’s plan was merely an expression of 
her intense womanliness — of her mild, con- 
ciliatory, and yielding character. Made for 
love, she was all for love in others, and 
would have had all people gentle and ami- 
able as herself. Hatred she knew in only 
one form : a timorous and shrinking hatred 
of brute force, of reckless passion, of merci- 
less justice. That is to say, she hated 
those things which were especially charac- 
teristic of the male, and which the male had 
impressed upon the laws and customs of 
that day. Her plan, therefore, was to form 
her son’s character on a pattern which 
seemed nobler than the fashion. 

Really, although she could not realize the 
fact, this pattern was her own. 

So she strove in love during the child’s 
infancy. Those feelings, thoughts, and traits 
which she loved, were cherished in him and 
grew to fill his whole being, and when his 
ambition awoke it was an ambition to spread 

84 


MR. LANGDON'S STORY 


over the whole earth the teachings of his 
mother, and, in the highest sense of the 
word, to feminize all men, even as he had 
been feminized. 

No more womanly woman than Mary was 
subsequently made by the mechanic. He 
continued to work through the individuals 
whom he prompted, but changed the 
woman-pattern scarcely at all, except that 
gradually and quite naturally he gave the 
female a dash of that robustness which he 
was taking away from the male. As for 
the male, he, little by little, was fairly 
reconstructed — to such an extent that finally 
he himself looked with detestation upon 
many of the attributes which had been 
regarded as manly, and even as the crown- 
ing distinction of his sex. 

How far this transformation has advanced, 
may be seen from the very latest happen- 
ing in toy-society. 

There was a certain man, known among his 
fellows as a fairly representative toy. Among 
women he was spoken of as “eligible.” He 
was strong, rich, clever, and of good habits. 

And there was a certain woman, of mar- 
riageable age. She was also strong, clever, 
and, of course, virtuous. 

85 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


The woman looked upon the man, and 
decided that she would like to have him for 
her pleasure and her service. She attracted 
him with charming skill ; she overcame him ; 
she compelled him to promise, in effect, 
that he would support her, his wife, in lux- 
ury and idleness. Many other toy-people 
stood by, to see to it that the man kept his 
promise, and to threaten him with punish- 
ment more or less severe if he failed in any 
slight particular to carry out this agreement. 

The man showed himself no match for the 
woman in the principal concerns of toy- 
society, because such matters had always 
been the peculiar province of woman, 
whereas man was comparatively but a begin- 
ner. Still, all went quite well in this mar- 
riage so long as the man’s wealth lasted. 
The man had learned the womanly virtues 
of submission, patience, conciliation, and 
modesty. He was what toy-people now 
call a “manly man,’’ though to the original 
toy-men he would have seemed contempt- 
ibly smooth and dainty — neither more nor 
less than womanish. But when the woman 
had spent his money, then she lashed him 
to his work: with her tongue she lashed 
him ; with her exactions ; with the approval 
86 


MR. LANGDON^S STORY 


of toy-society she lashed him and drove 
him to his work. 

The mechanic perceived that woman now 
had her revenge. Finally man had become 
her slave more completely than, in the 
beginning, she had been his — more com- 
pletely, because, when the savage woman 
had been the savage man’s slave, other sav- 
ages had tried to take her away. 

The hatred between man and woman, the 
instinctive hatred often clothed as love, was 
changing from tragedy, with its single dense 
shadow, into comedy, with much diverting 
play of light and shade. 

But then the man’s strength began to fail. 
His work was not up to the mark, in spite of 
frantic efforts on his part and in spite of all 
the woman’s goading. He began to be 
often unsuccessful. Shame and the fear of 
shame seized upon him. He put all of his 
strength into a last effort, and then lay 
down to die. 

The mechanic still had in mind the first 
female slave, and he looked to see the gleam 
of hate, and the blow — such as the woman 
had bestowed — now to come from the man, 
to make the story of his subjugation quite 
like the story of that shaggy feminine crea- 
87 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


ture. But no. The toy- doctors were at 
hand; decently attentive and watchful toys 
were placed around the tiny bedstead; the 
man returned the woman’s kiss. And then 
his spring was broken, and the delicate little 
wheels in the toy-man stood still. 

At this point Lejero forgot that the story 
dealt only with toys, and ended by crying 
out: “But was it that woman who killed 
that man, or was it the work of the Virgin 
herself — who has subjugated all men?’’ 

No one risked a direct reply. The first 
comment was made by General Cordoba, 
who said, “I should call that ‘The Ven- 
geance of the Female;’ ’’ and then, turning 
to Vincent, asked what he thought of it, 
adding, “Mr. Langdon is a misogynist, 
eh?’’ 

“Not quite that, I think,’’ said Vincent; 
“but perhaps he is not quite a philogynist, 
either.’’ 

“What is a philogynist?’’ Gloria asked. 

“The other sort of fellow,’’ said Vincent: 
“the sort of fellow who would be apt to 
point out a fallacy in the very sad conclu- 
sion of Mr. Langdon’s and Dr. Lejero’s 
story. I think a philogynist would be apt 


MR. LANGDON’S STORY 


to call attention to a certain peril which, in 
the immemorial contest between man and 
woman, leads too commonly to a wholly 
different outcome.” 

General Cordoba gleefully repeated the 
phrase, “leads too commonly to a different 
outcome,” and said, “Your words betray 
you, sir: you stand self-accused of phil- 
ogyny ! ’ ’ 

Of course Vincent was questioned as to 
the peril which he could intimate if he saw 
fit ; and, after resisting for a while, he con- 
sented to tell what he meant. It made a 
little story, or recitation, and it may stand, 
like Lejero’s story, in a chapter by itself. 

And first Vincent looked towards Gloria, 
who was smiling. Both had in mind that 
other occasion, upon which the one had 
used the argument of a violin to carry his 
point about taking the other to the theater. 


89 


XI 

Vincent Recites 

It was certainly one of the smallest feet 
in the world at that time. It had been 
bared, and was held out toward her father’s 
friend for his admiration, while she herself 
was lightly carried on her young father’s 
arm. Her dainty muslin frock, with soft 
trimmings, was admirably crisp, but she 
seemed to be more conscious of her shoe — 
the one that had not been taken off. 

“Look!” said her father. “Did you see 
any girl with such a tiny foot as that in 
Spain or China, you wanderer?” — showing 
the other leg, in a snowy sock, which, taper- 
ing suddenly, followed the creases in pink 
flesh down to the pink satin slipper. 

“What size is the shoe?” asked the 
Philogynist, with a laugh, but with fear, 
too, taking the smooth thing in his hand to 
turn its sole upward for inspection. “It’s a 
double naught! . . . But here’s a greater 
marvel: here’s one of the loveliest things 
90 


VINCENT RECITES 


in all the world,” he added, again touching 
the bare foot. A square inch of pure skin 
is worth more than all the covering in all 
the dry-goods shops.” 

He made them look at the sole of the 
bare foot, where was a shallow well, near 
the center, lined with dimples. 

And, after that, the Philogynist did not 
see her again until he and she became great 
friends at Geneva, about three years later. 
Then it was a pair of sturdy legs in thick, 
rough stockings, and a pair of feet in ugly 
common-sense shoes, without heels, that 
kept along by his side when they went in 
search of Swiss toys. 

One day he was taking her with her nurse 
out in a boat to see the swans on the lake — 
and Mont Blanc, that might be a distant 
great white swan of a mountain at rest 
against the horizon and the skyline of lower 
mountains — -when Miss Harcourt, a pretty 
English girl of eighteen, met them, and he 
asked her to come aboard. 

So Alice and her nurse and Miss Harcourt 
were sitting in the stern, while he rowed. 
They had fed the swans, and then he asked 
the child to sing. She had several good 
91 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


burnt were such things as these: Maidens 
had cast in love letters containing promises 
which had not been kept ; bits of ribbon and 
such feminine keepsakes had been brought 
by young men who had newer affairs; bot- 
tles filled with a liquid that would greatly 
aid the combustion had been desperately 
hurled against the logs by a few persons 
who had decided that in the coming year 
they would drink only out of mugs; and, 
offered on this rude altar, were the pipes of 
those who had learned to prefer cigars. 

Jena is such a secluded, old-fashioned 
German town that customs survive there 
from remote antiquity. In very ancient 
times the ancestors of these Germans 
believed in a god who brought light and 
warmth into the world each year, overcom- 
ing the darkness and cold of winter; and to 
the townspeople of Jena it still seems but 
right to greet the birth of the new year, 
with its promise of light and warmth and 
life. The great bonfire annually typifies 
this ever-new gift of the genial old god, and 
so it has come to be a custom to let this 
fire consume tokens of all those habits or 
happenings in the past that one wants to 
change or needs to forget. 


94 


VINCENT RECITES 

little before midnight the dark market- 
square was crowded. There were two or 
three men busied about the pile, and a 
larger number engaged in keeping the cen- 
tral space clear; so the throng was pressed 
back into a circle, behind which enclosing 
buildings lifted dim, irregular old stone 
faces against the sky. And to these gravely 
expectant townspeople presently came the 
sound of glad music — a marching band and 
a strong chorus of male voices, playing and 
singing in unison, ‘‘Let us rejoice, there- 
fore, while we are young”; and into the 
central space came students of the university 
dressed in the showy uniforms of their 
societies. Now quick flames shot upward 
from the pile and built a wavering column 
of fire; now the market square was bright 
as by day. Joining hands, the young men 
danced around, shouting and straining away, 
with averted faces, from that burning wrong 
of the old year and glowing hope of the 
new. For an instant, perhaps, it was seri- 
ous; then, in an instant, it all became gro- 
tesque. They broke the circle to tear caps 
from the heads of bystanders — from each 
other’s heads — to throw them also into the 
fire; the crowd was driven outward, and 
95 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


melted away through the many narrow pas- 
sages that led to other parts of the town, to 
people’s houses, to taverns — to the innu- 
rnerable places where sour white beer is 
served in little wooden buckets; there was 
a sound of heavy feet beating stone pave- 
ments in every quarter, and from every 
quarter arose the cry,* ‘‘Health to the 
New Year!” 

The Philogynist was standing with his 
friends in one of the front ranks in the circle 
of spectators around the bonfire. He was 
mindful of the little person whose head- 
was squeezed against him, reaching just 
above his elbow; and, lifting Alice up in 
his arms, he placed her on his shoulder so 
that she might have a good view. But it 
appeared to be a most unhappy child. She 
did not quite kick her old friend, but she 
squirmed; she had to be put down again. 
Alice was no longer a child, even to the 
Philogynist. 

And as she, little by little, year after 
year, came to be more evidently a woman, 
with the oval face and wondering eyes of a 
Virgin Mary in the Annunciation pictures, 
the Philogynist saw her only at rare inter- 
96 


VINCENT RECITES 


vals, until one summer that he passed at his 
friend’s house in the country near New 
York. They were together then pretty 
constantly, and with her parents’ approval ; 
but somehow she would not see that it was 
possible for him to come nearer to her than 
as her father’s friend; and for his part, he 
realized (it happened when he was standing 
at the window, looking out at the hammock 
in which she was swinging, though there 
was nothing of her to be seen but one lithe 
brown-kid foot) that while he was still a 
young man — yes, beyond question, he was 
a young man — he was not so young as really 
young people. 

Well, a year or two later, with a sense of 
personal loss, he took his dead friend’s place 
one morning, walking up the long church 
aisle, feeling Alice’s light touch on his arm. 
Her head was meekly bowed under the 
white veil and flowers; but within billowy 
skirts, stealing toward the man who came 
forward with easy confidence to meet her, 
were feet, clad in white satin, that seemed 
.to coquet with the very altar steps. 

But the other evening, when the Philogy- 
nist returned to New York after a long 


97 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


absence, he was sitting in the window at his 
club, watching the movement in the avenue, 
and was especially struck with the appear- 
ance of the pavements. It had been rain- 
ing, and the pavements gleamed. They 
were very dirty, no doubt; the rain-water 
struggling with that tenacious deposit upon 
the stones of an ill-kept city was not exactly 
a pretty thing to study ; and yet — and yet — 
there was such a human quality in the gleam 
of that wet pavement — the stones were so 
dear to him, and they were dear to so many, 
from association; so many feet had brushed 
them, pressed them, stamped upon them, 
and clattered over them. The gleam from 
them was human indeed; it was like the 
gleam of an eye. 

He had touched the bell, and a waiter 
was standing to take his order. 

Would you have a card, sir?” 

He did not hear. His eyes were riveted 
on the figure of a woman, evidently one 
over-familiar with pavements as they look 
at night, standing under the street light 
only a few yards distant ; and instantly the 
whole course of his blood was through 
incarnate pain and shame. ‘*So like! so 


98 


VINCENT RECITES 


like! What a horrible resemblance! what 
a damnable likeness!” 

Just then she bent down and caught her 
skirts together with one hand, lifting them, 
and showing a tiny shoe and a silk stocking. 


99 


XII 

A Lover at Large 

It is high time to describe both Dr. 
Lejero and Mr. Taswell Langdon; and per- 
haps the best way will be to begin with a 
saying, to be ascribed to the latter, which 
was especially true as applied to the former. 

These Andalusians live,'" said Mr. Lang- 
don; ‘Tn misfortune as in prosperity, they 
live. They are intensely and socially alive. 
They are not obliged to buy happiness with 
money, for their hearts will beat, throb, 
exult in spite of fate — not just tick, tick 
like a watch, faster or slower as they are 
more or less wound up with a golden key.” 

Manuel Lejero was tall and stout; made 
estimable by the strong black hairs of his 
pointed beard and mustache; amiable by 
reason of his frequent smiles, which showed 
childishly even white teeth; jaunty, because 
he took short steps in walking; and the 
very mirror of Andalusian fashion, only 
when he wore the Spanish cloak — having 


lOO 


Mi 



A street in SEVILLE 




A LOVER AT LARGE 


fourteen different ways of putting it on. 
He strove mightily and constantly to cover 
the fact that his father was a Gallego — a 
native of Galicia, that province in the north 
which produces the most hardy, the most 
useful, and the most despised variety of 
Spaniards. Manuel, however, had been born 
in Seville, of an Andalusian mother, and as 
a child had learned from his Andalusian 
playmates to poke fun at Gallegos. Fancy 
his position when he became old enough to 
learn that his own father was a native of 
that grotesque province. Luckily his father 
had never figured in society, and few of 
Manuel’s friends were aware of his deep and 
husky voice, slow and heavy ways, and gen- 
eral clumsiness of thought and action. So 
the son just went on poking fun at Gallegos, 
with the rest of the world : and his efforts 
to become like the Andalusians had pro- 
duced in him their leading characteristics in 
excess. Nevertheless, the Gallego blood 
had assisted him in his career more than he 
knew, for it had given him that force of 
will and that obstinacy of purpose which, in 
happy union with his insinuating Southern 
manners, had enabled him to become suc- 
cessful beyond his years in the profession of 


lOI 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


medicine; and perhaps from the same 
source came his enormous physical strength 
— the strength of an Andalusian bull in a 
graceful human body. He did not plume 
himself publicly upon his merits, as many 
Sevillian youths do, for he really possessed 
them ; but he would let them appear when- 
ever he had professional dealings with Eng- 
lish or American people, who, he thought, 
held all Spaniards to be frivolous and weak. 

Socially, his behavior illustrated the more 
garish Andalusian traits, and he held too 
exclusively the Andalusian point of view, 
which is so different from ours and from 
that of our English friends — so widely dif- 
erent! A little story will show. Here it is: 

Mr. and Mrs. Norton of Liverpool ar- 
rived in Seville one afternoon, and, after 
an hour’s rest, went out for a quiet walk 
and to have a look at the town. Passing 
through a narrow street in front of their 
hotel, they reached Calle Sierpes, and 
wandered on into the labyrinthian quarter 
beyond, where they lost their way. Mr. 
Norton began to hesitate at every corner, 
and each time he did so he saw a man in a 
cloak keeping behind them at a certain dis- 
tance — which detail irritated him as night 


102 


A LOVER AT LARGE 


fell and the lawless windings and haphazard 
intersections of the streets grew more and 
more perplexing. 

Finally, at a turning, they lost sight of 
the man; but imagine their surprise when, 
at the next corner they reached, he stood 
in a doorway and made some remark to 
the Englishwoman which the Englishman’s 
ignorance of the Spanish language prevented 
him from understanding. Still, with racial 
deliberateness, Mr. Norton waited until he 
became quite sure that the stranger contin- 
ued to address his remarks to Mrs. Norton 
only, before he turned to face the Spaniard 
with a mighty wave of his English stick, and 
the question, ‘‘Do you speak French, sir?” 

“Certainly, sir,” was the smiling answer. 

“What do you mean by addressing this 
lady ?’ ’ 

“To pay her the compliments she so richly 
deserves.” The man’s teeth gleamed at the 
pale Englishwoman as he raised his head 
from the deep bow which had accompanied 
these words. 

“You scoundrel! That lady is my wife.” 
(A more furious wave of the stick.) 

“Ah, sir, your position is, then, the most 
enviable one, next to that of a Governor- 
103 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


General of a rich colony, in the whole uni- 
verse.” 

^^You have not only spoken to her, sir, 
but you try to justify your conduct, sir,” 
continued the infuriated Mr. Norton. ” And 
I shall have you arrested for the insult ; by 
my soul, I will — ’ ’ 

“Pardon me,” interrupted the other, 
with an adequate gesture of the hand, 
which was opened to its full extent, quiv- 
ered for an instant in the air, and then was 
drawn back, palm outward, against the 
breast. “Pardon me, I am not a scoundrel, 
nor have I insulted you or your wife. On 
the contrary, I have given up to you one 
hour of my dinner time in order to admire 
the graceful lady whom I saw pass with you 
as I stood talking to a friend at the door of 
my club — the Labradores Club, in the Calle 
Sierpes. If you wish to arrest me, you will 
not fail to find me at my house; and this is 
my visiting card. With a profound retreat- 
ing inclination of the body, he, so to speak, 
saluted himself out of sight. 

In hot pursuit the husband rounded the 
nearest corner, but saw an empty street, 
and heard only, as in the distance, the light 
tread of Spanish feet. He hurried to the 


104 


A LOVER AT LARGE 


next turning, but corner upon corner ap- 
peared, taunting him with acute angles, 
obtuse angles, never a right angle ; turning 
upon turning appeared, but never the 
chance for a straightaway dash. With a 
final oath, he retraced his steps to meet 
Mrs. Norton as she came toward him, trem- 
bling with fear even as he was trembling 
with rage. 

After further wandering, this weary pair 
reached their hotel, conducted by a sereno 
with lantern and spear. They were very 
late for dinner — they insisted that it must 
be a dinner — and Mr. Norton ate his food 
with a scowl upon his heated face which 
might otherwise have terrified the natives, 
but that those who saw him shake his spoon 
in the air attributed his temper to a mouth- 
ful of Spanish soup. “He would bring the 
fellow to justice,” was his mental com- 
ment; “he would see the British Consul 
that very evening, and inquire whether a 
gentleman traveling for pleasure in a for- 
eign country could be molested with 
impunity.” 

And he did see Mr. J — , the British Vice- 
Consul. Naturally he took a guide this 
time, who led him unerringly to the con- 
105 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


sulate in Calle Guzman el Bueno. The 
consul explained, with much courtesy, that 
there might have been no intentional rude- 
ness on the Spaniard’s part, and requested 
permission to see the card. When this was 
produced, “Manuel Lejero,’’ read Mr. J — 
“Dr. Manuel Lejero. He’s not a bad sort, 
for a Spaniard; one of the most popular 
young physicians in Seville. 

“Dr. Lejero was only acting in accord- 
ance with a custom of the country,’’ the 
tolerant consul continued ;“ and although 
the custom was a singular one, it must be 
endured while one was there.’’ 

Nothing would appease Mr. Norton, who 
insisted upon “appealing, sir, to the com- 
mon justice of the country to have the cus- 
tom done away with, sir, in order that 
ladies might be respected in future.’’ 

So he went out from the consulate in a 
temper. 

The affair was actually brought into court. 

The court-room was crowded to suffoca- 
tion by the fashion of the town. The 
judge was a personal friend of the defend- 
ant. There was a rustling of crisp skirts, 
the ripple of fans opening, the whir of fans 
in use, the report of fans sharply closed, 

io6 


A LOVER AT LARGE 


and there were numerous low coughs from 
the doctor’s best patients. One could not 
say where, yet surely theie were a few puffs 
of smoke from contraband cigarettes and an 
occasional “ah” from a male throat. With 
his fair wife at his side, Mr. Norton did 
not seem in the least disconcerted by this 
fine array of Sevillians; but, for all their 
staring, stared back through his eyeglass, as 
though at a collection of Asiatics whom he 
had come to teach. Dr. Lejero, in his 
English coat and French beard, cheerfully 
supported his own elegance and the admira- 
tion of his friends. 

“What is the charge brought against 
Seflor Don Manuel Lejero by the honorable 
English stranger?” inquired the judge, 
looking toward the interpreter. 

He was accused by Mr. Norton of insult- 
ing his wife and himself in the streets of 
Seville. This charge was denied by Dr. 
Lejero. 

“What was the nature of the insult?” 

“Following them.” 

A roar came from the audience, and Gen- 
eral Cordoba shouted, “Custom of the 
country.” Mr. Norton was indignant 
because he could not understand why they 
107 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


laughed, and when an explanation had been 
given he was more indignant still. 

"'How did Mr. Norton know that Dr. 
Lejero had intended to follow them?” 

“Because Dr. Lejero had so stated when 
Mr. Norton threatened to cane him.” 

“What did Mr. Norton mean by threat- 
ening to beat a gentleman in the street?” 

“He meant to reprove him for having 
insulted Mrs. Norton by speaking to her.” 

“What had Dr. Lejero said to her?” 

Mr. Norton did not know, but the mere 
fact of his having addressed her was in itself 
insulting and outrageous, utterly at variance 
with the customs of England and — ” 

“But this is not England,” the judge 
began to interpose, when he in turn was 
interrupted by the exclamation, Gracias a 
Dios!'' (Thank God) from a woman in the 
audience — which phrase was repeated by 
His Honor, with a bow of acknowledgment 
in her direction. 

“Still, justice is always freely accorded 
where due,” the judge continued, “and 
Mr. Norton shall have his satisfaction if in 
the right, as soon as Dr. Lejero has made 
public his remarks to the lady.” 

Laughter and applause were given in 
io8 


A LOVER AT LARGE 


return for this assurance that the remarks 
were to be repeated; and then the judge 
questioned and Lejero answered. 

The Judge (to Dr. Lejero, who was now 
requested to stand): ^‘Have you ever seen 
this lady and gentleman before?” 

Dr. Lejero: ‘‘Yes; on Thursday, when I 
was invited to the house of the Conde de 
F. for dinner. I got there late because I 
lingered in order to pay the English lady a 
few compliments.” 

The Judge: “Mr. Norton accuses you 
of having addressed his wife twice, and, 
he even adds, insultingly. What did you 
say the first time?” 

Dr. Lejero: “That her hair was like the 
golden clouds at sunset.” 

The Judge (to Mr. Norton): “My dear 
sir, I cannot find even the most minute 
insult in so true a statement.” 

Mr. Norton at this point began to look 
uncomfortable; Mrs. Norton, on the con- 
trary, seemed more at ease. 

The Judge: “What was your second 
insulting speech?” 

Dr. Lejero: “I told her that her eyes 
were like the blue sky under the golden 
clouds.” 

109 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


‘^Ah,” cried Anita, from the audience, 
with a little gurgle of delight, ‘Vhat a 
poet ! ’ ’ 

The Judge: ^‘That was a beautiful com- 
parison.” Then (to Mr. Norton): “Surely, 
sir, you can find no fault with that truth, 
but must feel proud to be the owner of so 
much English loveliness. I hold Dr. 
Lejero guiltless of any offence toward you or 
your charming wife. He did what any 
gentleman in his place might have done, 
and I can only add that I am surprised that 
you have not the entire male population of 
Seville to attack on the same head. For 
myself, permit me most respectfully to say 
that, had I not been forewarned in regard to 
your preference (as a representative of a 
nation which I salute, with assurance of 
personal esteem,) that people should say 
nothing at all, not even the most pleasant 
things, to your lady, you would now, doubt- 
less, see me a prisoner at the bar, instead 
of in this judicial chair.” 


no 


XIII 

Mr. Taswell Langdon 

Maturity, having been foiled completely 
in its attempts to find lodgment in Mr. 
Langdon’s heart, showed itself in the lines 
of his face. 

Some of these lines were apparently due 
to his way of speaking, for he spoke with a 
drawl, throwing his chin forward and up- 
ward, separating his lips more than was 
necessary and working the jaw excessively. 
So the drawl had given him sharp lines at 
each side of the mouth, and had drawn the 
skin about the eyes in such a manner that 
you might ascribe to the latter a vacant 
expression if by any chance you had failed 
to notice that these were really eyes of 
unusual intelligence. 

Although an American, Mr. Taswell 
Langdon had acquired the use of his hands 
in conversation, because he had been in 
many countries where he could not at first 
make himself understood by words alone. A 


I 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


sidewise manner, apt to mislead those who 
insist upon point-blank and staring direct- 
ness, was in truth merely attributable to the 
fact that Mr. Taswell Langdon’s nose was 
slightly twisted, and (good-natured man!) 
he knew that in profile his face was more 
pleasant to look at, the twist being less 
apparent. His hair and mustache inclined 
to length, darkness and disorder, yet he was 
a very clean man. Every mental picture I 
make of him must include an umbrella, 
which never had a snug cover; a good silk 
umbrella, however, entirely rain-proof — 
useful also in dry weather, when he came 
to sunny places. 

Though his head was small, it was well 
stored with knowledge in layers, each layer 
being labeled, lettered, numbered. He 
would draw on his funds of information by 
letter. For example, suppose you had 
met him in Seville at this time, and the 
subject of a war between Spain and the 
United States had come up for discussion. 
You would have seen at first that he was 
thinking of the letter W and the word War, 
and that, as though by referring to a bibliog- 
raphy somewhere in his cool brain, he was 
in command of histories of all wars, ancient 


113 


MR. TASWELL LANGDON 


and modern, and was reasoning from the 
known to the unknown. And then, per- 
haps, the following conversation would have 
occurred : 

Mr. Langdon: “There is a social barrier 
between the two races, and this must be 
broken down by war, of course. It is sure 
to come to war between us some day, and 
then the stupid and vulgar element of 
the population of each country will revile 
the hostile nation. We who have taken the 
forces of nature into partnership will over- 
whelm the Spaniards easily in battle; but 
when we have battered down the walls 
which divide nation from nation, when we 
have received a large number of people of 
Spanish blood into our Union, we shall be 
almost defenceless against a certain peace- 
ful conquest which they will undertake. 
The reaction from violent abuse will lead to 
overpraise of both sides. Friends of the 
Latin race will begin to say among us that 
Spaniards are as superior to us in social tal- 
ent as they are inferior to us in mechanical 
skill and invention, industry, commerce, and 
all that. We shall whip them in war with 
one hand behind our back ; they will whip us 
socially with one hand behind their back,” 

113 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


The Reader: 

Mr. Langdon: “A true estimate of the 
Spanish character would lie between the two 
extremes of censure and of praise; but in 
one way, among themselves, how much they 
accomplish now — with how little!” 

The Reader: 

Mr. Langdon: “Their particular kind of 
talent, in combination with our material 
resources and our principles, would make 
the most brilliant society in the world.” 

The Reader: 

Mr. Langdon: “Oh, as for that, we 
might draw an argument from the Irish, who 
are good fighters and good poets — whose 
women are most beautiful and most virtu- 
ous. The distinctive charm of the Irish is 
probably due to a strain of Iberian blood. 
It is beyond question that Spaniards of an 
early day overran Ireland, as conquerors at 
times, and again as colonists. By the way. 
I’ve come across a funny little poem by a 
resident of Seville, beginning: 

‘We have not yet forgotten that Spaniards Ireland 
won, 

And Spanish blood and beauty through all the Gaels 
were run.’ ” * 

♦A fact. It is interesting to find Gael used in its old sense— 
an Irish, rather than Scottish, Celt. 

1 14 


MR. TASWELL LANGDON 


It will be observed that no effort has 
been made to supply the reader’s lines in 
this imaginary conversation ; and, if it 
appears that Mr. Langdon has the last 
word, it is distinctly understood that the 
reader always retains this privilege, however 
much the poor little characters may say. 
And so let us continue the attempt to real- 
ize Mr. Langdon. 

With so little physical strength that he 
shrank from any sudden exertion, or even 
the effort involved in throwing the shoul- 
ders back, he had yet a good deal of endur- 
ance — enough for long walks, and for long 
hours of study and travel. Almost no 
digestion he had, poor fellow ! At the end 
of a meal his food — carefully chosen and 
specially prepared, all of it — would seem to 
have intoxicated him just a little. 

As a young man he had known moderate 
hardship, to the extent of working his way 
through a New England college; and one 
story he loved to repeat about himself, per- 
haps because it sounded like an incident in 
the career of some leading character in fic- 
tion. This story was to the effect that 
after he had become eminent enough to be 
the guest of the evening at a certain dinner 
115 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


in Washington, his fair hostess, with flat- 
tering interest, asked where he had laid the 
foundation of his learning. 

When Mr. Langdon replied, giving the 
name of his college, 

‘^Oh, were you there?” she said. “Then 
perhaps you know my friend. Professor X?” 

“Quite well, madam,” said he, very 
simply. “I was his hostler for four years.” 

In that sort of way he did, I must con- 
fess, affect to be unaffected; but the affec- 
tation was so amiable! He was incapable 
of serious deceit, but just romanced about 
himself quite innocently, making of himself 
a character that he could look up to, as well 
as the rest of us. “You see,” he would 
say with a laugh, “I have reached the age 
of thirty without marrying; that has enabled 
me to treat myself with respect.” 

More than once people have said to me: 
“What is there about this Langdon that 
makes everybody like him? He is such a 
plain fellow, so badly dressed, and all that.” 

Well, for one thing, he had the reputation 
of a great scholar, yet always gave you the 
impression in speaking with you that you 
were better informed than himself. He 
wore that decoration which is perhaps more 

ii6 


MR. TASWELL LANGDON 


honorable than the Iron Cross or the red 
button or the Golden Fleece: he was decor- 
ated by the rare courtesy of knowledge; 
and to all his capability was joined a certain 
noble incapacity — for he was so full of kind- 
ness as to be incapable of malice. Still he 
had spirit enough to keep him from being 
humble. And then, he was sympathetic; 
he always gave you the soothing idea that 
your affairs were of vital importance to him ; 
that your person was agreeable to him. 
“That was his trouble,” he would confess: 
“everybody and everything interested him; 
he had not enough strength.” 

And while he was making such confessions 
you would be sure to notice more than ever 
how he sat in a heap or lounged against 
some support. 

His arrival in Seville became known to 
the household quite early in the year, and 
in the following manner: 

One morning the postman brought a 
Spanish circular, which I take the liberty of 
translating, with inelegant literalness: 

“School of Seven Languages. 

“ A North-American gentleman, who is a lawyer 
and member of the New York bar, instructor at Yale 
University in the United States, where, as also at the 
117 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


principal universities of England and Germany, he 
has pursued extensive courses of study and published 
some literary works in the English language, offers 
to give lessons in English, German, French, Italian, 
Latin, and Greek; likewise in natural history, geog- 
raphy, mathematics, chemistry, physics, etc. 

“ This furnishes to the principal families of Seville 
an opportunity to secure for their sons the advantages 
of a most excellent education in the foreign style, 
without the disadvantages connected with residence 
in a foreign country. 

“Only a limited number of scholars will be re- 
ceived, in order that due attention may be given to 
them. 

“For information apply to No. i, Fernandez 
Espino Street.” 

Now, by all that is modest, what stray 
“North American” pedagogue was this, 
bringing his shipload of erudition to the 
port of Seville, of all places in the world — 
to ignorant and proudly ignorant Seville? 
Gloria’s curiosity was aroused, and therefore 
Vincent went to Calle Fernandez Espino, 
No. I, “for information.” The house was 
a “house of guests” (in Spanish phrase), 
kept by a stout, good-looking Welshwoman, 
whose father had been sent to Seville in the 
employ of English capitalists. Vincent was 
taken to a room on the second floor, and 
there, sitting in a heap on the sofa, was Mr. 
Taswell Langdon. 


COLEGIO DE LOS SlETE IDIOMAS 


ca^a/^^io noite'amencano, '{ji'cenci'ac^o c/e 
■^e^eo, (^^o^ac/o c/ef <S:>/ac/o c/e (3<t- 

/e€/ta//co c/e /a ^^ntveiti/t/ac/ c/e ^3^/^ ^^^/at/od-^/tt/- 
c/o^J a c/onc/e, como en /aj ^^nivei^tc/ac/eti 

c/e <^n^/a/ena. y ^ec^o eo/ett^o^ e^/u^ 

c/toii, au/oi c/e vai/a^i o^tad ^/eiai/ay t'n^/e:>A:>, o^ece 
c/ai ^cctcne:^ c/e t*t^/e:>, a/eman, ^anced, t/aftano, /a/tn 
y yiteyo, coma /am^/en a/e A/:>/otta na/uia^ yeoy^a^a, 
ma/ema/ica, cj/^uimtcay ^tca, e/c. 

(So/o o^ece d /a.i y>i/nc/y>a/ey c/e ( 2 ^. 

una oca:>tott c/e a'ieyttiai a ou:> ^yo:i veit/a- 
jci^ c/c uftQ ec/ucac/cn e:>meiac/t6tma, af ea/t^ ex/ian^ 
y'cio, dtn /o:> tHCOHvenien/ed c/e ima ledia/enc/a ert y>aty 
^'ano. 

<^o/o oe ac/m//tid ttn mime to /tmt/ao/o c/e c/toc*' 
^aia t^ue oe yuec/a c//oyenoat ^ c/e^tc/a 
cc/encton. 

^/zyarioe pot tn^zmeo a 


Calle Foroandez Espino, ndni. I. 


!i' 

S( 


MR. TASWELL LANGDON 


Then great shouts went up, — shouts of 
recognition and of laughter. 

‘‘Did you get my circular?” Mr. Langdon 
cried. “Was that what brought you?” 

“ Your circular! You amazing old joker!” 

“Not much of a joke,” he said, sobering. 
“In fact, it’s dead earnest.” 

“You mean — ” 

“I mean just what is stated in that gran- 
diloquent circular, adapted to Spanish 
tastes.” 

Then they had a long talk, going over 
experiences since they had last met, years 
before; but pray allow me to cut it short. 
Mr. Langdon had made a plan covering 
years of study, and, taking a deep breath, 
had bound himself to the plan by the big- 
gest oath he knew. You see, he realized 
that he was weak, and he wanted plan and 
oath to lean upon as he forced his way to 
the goal. With American ingenuity and 
adaptability he had continued to support 
himself, turning his hand to almost any kind 
of work that had a living in it, yet left some 
leisure for his books; teaching and writing 
with moderate success when no more re- 
munerative occupation could be found ; lay- 
ing by money for extraordinary expenses. 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


and then, when enough had been saved, 
spending it to the last cent, without a 
thought beyond the accomplishment of his 
immediate purpose. Not the least interest- 
ing feature in his plan was that which dealt 
with the languages, customs, and history of 
modern European nations. During almost 
ten years he had devoted all his available 
time to these subjects, and had succeeded in 
making himself at home in France, England, 
Germany and Italy, regarding himself as a 
resident rather than a mere tourist while in 
each of these countries; but when Spain’s 
turn came he found himself, not only with- 
out money, but also out of patience with the 
old method of earning and saving. At- 
tempting to conquer this distaste, he dis- 
covered that it still grew upon him. So, 
then — another deep breath (he would not 
use the word inspiration, saying it was too 
fine for him) — odds and ends sold to pay 
his passage ; and, still leaning on his plan, 
behold Mr. Taswell Langdon in Seville. 

His circular, issued in haste; Vincent’s 
call, also in haste — that is the whole story 
up to the time of meeting. The circular 
served the end for which it was intended: 
it brought scholars. There was not a word 


120 


MR. TASWELL LANGDON 


in it for which Mr. Langdon had not his 
reason ready. When Vincent ventured to 
say that he could not understand the 
designation ‘^School of Seven Languages” 
when only six languages were mentioned in 
the body of the advertisement, the erudite 
adventurer drawled : 

‘‘Well, the seventh language is Spanish, 
of course.” 

“But who is going to learn that — in 
Spain?” 

“Why, er — I am going to learn that,” he 
said. “I must do something for myself.” 

As Vincent was successful in his prompt 
endeavor to transfer both the teacher and 
his books to the household in Nohacenada 
street, Mr. Langdon’s subsequent experi- 
ences were shared as a feast among friends. 

Fortunately for Mr. Langdon, in the days 
when he knew scarcely enough Spanish to 
make himself understood, his first scholar 
spoke French fluently. 

That was Sefiora Mendez, Spanish wife of 
Mendez Bey, a high officer at the court 
of the late Khedive. 

Andalusian society, with its uncertain ad- 
mixture of Moorish blood and traditions, 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


and the influence of a connection with the 
Philippines which endured for more than 
three centuries, is half Levantine ; and the 
character of Seftora Mendez showed, how 
easily an Andalusian may become wholly 
Oriental. She was only spending a season 
in her native town ; almost all of the 
winters of her married life, which began at 
the age of fifteen, had been passed in Cairo, 
and her summers in Alexandria. 

She told secrets in conversation, still call- 
ing them secrets after they were told. ‘‘To 
grow old imperceptibly — that is the secret,” 
she would say. “To frequent balls — yes; 
but dancing less and less, and spending 
more and more time in the card-room. To 
make friends of the women of one’s own 
age ; to watch gray hairs come in their heads 
also; and, sitting at cards, to have occupa- 
tion for the hands, so that when gentlemen 
pay court we may be busy, and though they 
lean over our chairs, we may seem not to 
flirt at our age. To give up dancing — yes!” 
— doubling her fist and shaking it with reso- 
lution — “yes, but the fact is, that does take 
courage. When one is near the door of the 
card-room, and one is not yet too plain — 
one is well dressed — a gentleman invites you 


122 


MR. TASWELL LANGDON 


to waltz. He says to one, * Madame, how 
does it happen that you dance no more?’ 
And you reply, ^Sir, as for me, the leaves 
are beginning to fall;’ and then you laugh. 

^‘He entreats you; he pays you compli- 
ments; he begs you for one waltz more — 
only one. Then — why, then you do need 
courage; and very graciously you say: ^But, 
sir, you must excuse me this evening, for 
the Countess is claiming her revenge at 
b^zique, and you know it is a question of 
honor.’ And then, turning to the Coun- 
tess, who appreciates your motives, you 
say: ‘My pretty one, I am at your serv- 
ice.’ 

“One must leave off while the men still 
desire to dance with one, and then they con- 
tinue to invite you always — not with the 
intention of securing you for a partner, but 
what does that matter to gray hairs? When 
one passes, the gallant gentlemen say: 

“ ‘Not this evening, Seftora Mendez?’ 

“ ‘Not this evening, I thank you very 
much, sirs.’ ’’ 

This plaintive talk made her wonderfully 
attractive, for there really was not a gray 
hair visible above her smooth brow ; her lips 
looked just fully ripe; it seemed there had 
123 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


been never a care to take from her eyes 
their liquid light. 

But if her auditor looked or spoke his 
admiration too warmly, she would know how 
to cool sentiment with a dash of humor, 
yet without turning the conversation too 
suddenly away from herself. “My hus- 
band,” she would say — “how I wish you 
knew him, sir; but he cannot leave his post. 
He is so good-natured — my Mendez. 
Fancy: In the morning I may say to him, 
‘Mendez, you must get up;’ then I put my 
little foot against his very little back (Men- 
dez is much smaller than I am). With a 
delicate movement — ping! There lies 
Mendez on the carpet. But he is so good- 
natured. And besides, he is so fat that the 
fall does not hurt him. 

“Afterward, in the evening, when I have 
seen Mendez, so dignified, so proud, stand- 
ing before the Khedive with his breast cov- 
ered with decorations; and when I have 
heard the chamberlain announcing ‘Mon- 
sieur the Baron de Mendez, Ambassador of 

, Consul of , etc., etc.,’ then 

I have said to myself; ‘Fancy it! There 
is the man I kicked out of bed only this 
morning.’ ” 


124 


MR. TASWELL LANGDON 


English words are either quite naked or 
bundled up in furs. It is not possible in 
translation to convey the reserve, the 
artistic holding at arm’s length, that Sefiora 
Mendez put into her Spanish or French. 
She used these languages as a painter 
chooses his brushes. 

An Andalusian Orientalized, Sphinx-like, 
graceful with a quiet and immovable grace, 
her stories, which she told whenever there 
was nothing else to say, were like classics — 
so pure in style and so smooth. Gesticula- 
tion she would indeed allow herself, but 
using only forearm, wrist and hand — her 
elbows glued to her sides. If it ever be- 
came necessary to raise the elbow for a 
conspicuous gesture, that would call for a 
gracious, Pardon me, like this.” She was 
indeed conscious of all the animation that 
was her birthright as an Andalusian; but 
she fully realized her size; she knew that 
she was a very large woman. How to 
indulge in the animation by means of which 
a slender person wins applause? In her 
answer to this problem lay her victory, for 
she attained a sort of quiet sparkle. 

And you will not think ” quiet sparkle” 
a contradiction of terms, for you have seen 
125 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


the jewels in old white wine as you have 
held a glass of it up to the light, or you 
have sat before an open wood fire that has 
burned beyond its snapping period, but 
has not yet begun to need a fresh log. 

Sefiora Mendez wrote to Mr. Langdon 
acknowledging receipt of his circular and 
requesting an interview at her father’s house 
in Calle Alfonso XII. Repairing to that 
street of palaces, Mr. Langdon found at the 
given number a house like a fortress, its 
heavy double doors studded with enormous 
brass spikes, a glimpse of greenery in its 
court showing through the dark portal. 
Alfonso XII is perhaps the most impressive 
of Seville’s fashionable streets. It is fash- 
ionable without being modern; the great 
residences of famous old families in that 
quarter seem to have been built with the 
Mexican and Peruvian silver and gold sent 
home in the time of Cortez and Pizarro. 

The lady was arrayed for this interview 
in the European style, and she received 
Mr. Langdon with marked favor. 

After the preliminaries had been disposed 
of, ‘‘And you will consent to give instruc- 
tion in the Greek?” asked Seftora Mendez, 
smiling faintly. 


126 


MR. TASWELL LANGDON 


57 




‘Xertainly, Madame,” said Mr. Lang- 
don. 

‘‘Then I am very much pleased,” she 
said, “for we have many Greeks in Egypt. 
I should like to learn the Greek from you — 
conversationally. Will you teach me to 
converse in Greek?” 

Poor Langdon ! 

He could explain the differences between 
ancient and modern Greek, he could em- 
phasize the importance of the former and 
minimize the interest of the latter, but he 
could not move Seflora Mendez from her 
intention. 

“Never mind those little differences,” 
she said. “Will you not come each day to 
instruct me in the Greek, conversationally, 
without those refinements which a woman’s 
mind cannot grasp?” 

She would not take a refusal; he was in 
for it. Day after day he went to Alfonso 
XII Street, finding that he was really not 
expected to teach more than he knew, and 
that she insisted upon believing that he 
knew a hundred times more than he was 
willing to teach or she to learn. And they 
played cards ^^avec rage,"' as she ex- 
pressed it. 


127 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


night, and said they found tobacco very 
strengthening to the throat. 

Caspar and Ramon Diaz del Castillo, 
young men respectively eighteen and 
twenty years of age, went to Mr. Langdon 
for lessons in a number of subjects. When 
a suitable time had elapsed the teacher sent 
in his bill, but no notice was taken of it. 
Another statement was mailed to the 
father; still no response. 

Now, fancy our honest — scrupulously 
honest — Langdon, resolved to demand his 
rights, standing before the wrought iron 
screen in the portal of the old Diaz del 
Castillo family mansion, which was situated 
in a street that leads out from the Plaza de 
la Encarnacion. 

He rang the bell repeatedly, but nobody 
came. Finally, looking across the inner 
court, he distinguished the figure of a slat- 
ternly maid, who, from the deep shadow 
of a gallery in the rear, was looking him 
over at her leisure. 

‘‘What does your grace desire?” the serv- 
ant shouted, seeing that she was discov- 
ered. It seemed to Mr. Langdon that the 
empty galleries surrounding this big patio 


130 


OTHER SCHOLARS 


swelled the woman’s voice with an insulting 
resonance. 

wish to see the gentleman of the 
house,” he said. 

^‘And what does your grace want?” she 
again asked, without stirring from her easy 
position. 

wish to see the gentleman of the 
house,” Mr. Langdon repeated. 

“Is it about a bill?” 

Now, just as it happened, this was quite 
correct, yet the answer “Yes” would have 
classed Mr. Langdon with small trades-peo- 
ple and collectors. That would have been 
a misleading answer, to say the least, so the 
caller hesitated for an instant. 

“I don’t know whether he is at home or 
not,” the maid continued. 

“Go and find out!” cried Mr. Langdon. 

“Anything about a bill?” 

In the midst of this dialogue a whining 
voice from above was heard. Curiosity had 
got the better of Seflora del Castillo, and 
“Who is it, Maria?” she asked. 

Mr. Langdon caught sight of her over the 
railing of a gallery on the left-hand side of 
the patioy and called to her. 

V^Ay, the sefior professor! What do you 
131 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


night, and said they found tobacco very 
strengthening to the throat. 

Caspar and Ramon Diaz del Castillo, 
young men respectively eighteen and 
twenty years of age, went to Mr. Langdon 
for lessons in a number of subjects. When 
a suitable time had elapsed the teacher sent 
in his bill, but no notice was taken of it. 
Another statement was mailed to the 
father; still no response. 

Now, fancy our honest — scrupulously 
honest — Langdon, resolved to demand his 
rights, standing before the wrought iron 
screen in the portal of the old Diaz del 
Castillo family mansion, which was situated 
in a street that leads out from the Plaza de 
la Encarnacion. 

He rang the bell repeatedly, but nobody 
came. Finally, looking across the inner 
court, he distinguished the figure of a slat- 
ternly maid, who, from the deep shadow 
of a gallery in the rear, was looking him 
over at her leisure. 

What does your grace desire?” the serv- 
ant shouted, seeing that she was discov- 
ered. It seemed to Mr. Langdon that the 
empty galleries surrounding this big patio 


OTHER SCHOLARS 


swelled the woman’s voice with an insulting 
resonance. 

“I wish to see the gentleman of the 
house,” he said. 

^‘And what does your grace want?” she 
again asked, without stirring from her easy 
position. 

wish to see the gentleman of the 
house,” Mr. Langdon repeated. 

“Is it about a bill?’ ’ 

Now, just as it happened, this was quite 
correct, yet the answer “Yes” would have 
classed Mr. Langdon with small trades-peo- 
ple and collectors. That would have been 
a misleading answer, to say the least, so the 
caller hesitated for an instant. 

“I don’t know whether he is at home or 
not,” the maid continued. 

“Go and find out!” cried Mr. Langdon. 

“Anything about a bill?” 

In the midst of this dialogue a whining 
voice from above was heard. Curiosity had 
got the better of Seflora del Castillo, and 
“Who is it, Maria?” she asked. 

Mr. Langdon caught sight of her over the 
railing of a gallery on the left-hand side of 
the patio^ and called to her. 

V^Ay, the sefior professor! What do you 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


mean, Maria, you slut? Open the door, 
you worthless baggage ! Be pleased to walk 
right in, sir.” 

As the door swung open and Mr. Lang- 
don entered, he heard the mistress scolding 
her servant. His rapidly acquired but still 
imperfect knowledge of Andalusian slang 
did not enable him to understand all the 
words used, but he caught terms which he 
had heard the mule-drivers employ when 
their beasts required oaths as well as re- 
sounding blows to urge them forward. 

”Oh, seftor professor, you want to see my 
husband?” the lady inquired, coming gra- 
ciously forward. ”If it’s something naughty 
my boys have been doing, may I not answer 
your purpose as well?” 

Mr. Langdon was forced to smile at this 
reference to the big-chested boys of eighteen 
and twenty, but assured her that they had 
not been naughty, and said he wished to see 
Sefior Diaz del Castillo particularly. 

Hearing the word ” particularly,” the 
lady emitted a little regretful sound, made by 
the tongue in contact with the upper teeth. 

(Teeth and tongue, the sound repeated 
four or five times.) ”Ah, the bill!” she 
said, softly. Her teeth, tongue and palate 
132 


OTHER SCHOLARS 


were all employed to express regret that 
cannot be spelled. Regret spread over her 
round face and became supreme. 

Mr. Langdon saw two or three children, 
who peeped at him from half-open doors. 
The house seemed suddenly awake, and 
there was a great slamming of dishes. On 
the walls of the room to which he was con- 
ducted were views of places which the peo- 
ple had never seen ; nor could any member 
of the family tell what these pictures repre- 
sented. Their ancestor had traveled for the 
entire race; these descendants bought for- 
eign landscapes. 

After a long whispered consultation be- 
tween the master and mistress of the house, 
Seflor Diaz del Castillo advanced, shooing 
the children away from patio and corridors 
as he came. But Mr. Langdon heard the 
children say, as they went with reluctant 
feet and lingering backward glances, that 
brother Caspar and brother Ramon had been 
naughty, and the teacher had come to tell 
about it. 

*‘You must excuse these children. Profes- 
sor Langdon," Seftor Diaz del Castillo said; 
"but I have a nursery-maid and a governess 
who are jackasses." 


133 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


Mr. Langdon was conscious of some em- 
barrassment. “I hope it will not trouble 
you,” he said, “if I inquire why you have 
not settled my bill, which has been stand- 
ing so long. I presume a man of large 
affairs, like yourself, sometimes forgets such 
trifles.” 

Shaking his head sadly, “Ah, sefior pro- 
fessor,” said the other, “you want me to 
pay that bill.” It was not a question, it 
was a melancholy conviction. 

“But I know you yourself want to pay 
it,” said Mr. Langdon; “only, being a man 
of engrossing affairs, you must have over- 
looked it.” 

“No, I have not overlooked it. I shall 
pay it ; but a thing that I always put off to 
the last is a school bill. There are certain 
things in life that really seem to be unneces- 
sary.” 

“But schooling is surely one of the most 
necessary things in life,” said Mr. Langdon. 

This statement roused Sefior del Castillo 
from his quiet mood. In a moment he was 
all excitement. “Education a necessary 
thing?” he queried. “To a certain point 
only. It is necessary to read, to write, 
and to calculate, because then people can- 
134 


OTHER SCHOLARS 


not deceive you. A laboring man requires 
nothing else ; a gentleman is born with 
everything else. What good will the edu- 
cation of those boys do me? I shall never 
get a peseta from them. No, it just gives 
them the right to be insolent. Let them 
read the newspapers and learn what is going 
on in the great world of politics, so as to 
know the proper views for a gentleman to 
hold in regard to the defence of his coun- 
try — that is enough. Still, it is the fashion 
to send boys to school. My friends Nuftez 
and Velasquez do it, and I presume they 
pay. Yes, I wish to pay the bill.” 

And he did pay. 

Now, as Mr. Langdon went from the 
great Diaz del Castillo house, he might have 
been expected (inasmuch as he was a stu- 
dent of the history of civilization) to draw 
a curious parallel between the views of the 
man he had just left and the views of that 
tough old sixteenth -century Bernal Diaz 
del Castillo, companion of Cortez. But, in 
point of fact, his thoughts took another 
direction. He was asking himself how much 
importance should be attached to the cir- 
cumstance that these people were so care- 
less in their dress at home : the men without 


135 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


cravats, the women in white petticoats and 
white waists. 

“I wonder how much civilization it takes 
to make people care about wearing pretty 
what-do-you-call-’ems, to please the eyes, 
while depleting the pockets, of ‘nearest and 
dearest’?” mused this student of manners 
and customs. 

You see, it was impossible, even for him^ 
at that moment, to think of the Spaniards 
as a fully civilized people, in spite of his 
strong prepossession in their favor. 

But our good professor did not refuse to 
receive much younger scholars, even the 
youngest applying for admission to his 
colegio. Not that there was any merit in 
this complaisance; he said and thought 
only that he couldn’t afford to refuse them. 
He was therefore brought into contact with 
the Spanish idea (not exclusively Spanish, 
we must confess) that education consists in 
getting the children out of the house, to let 
them make a noise in the teacher’s house — 
to which end the Andalusian parent is willing 
to pay, or promise to pay, from two to five 
dollars a month, as though for a day-nursery. 

Among other pupils, two little boys were 
136 


OTHER SCHOLARS 


brought to Mr. Langdon by their mother, 
the vivacious wife of a banker whose house 
had a branch or agency in Paris. The 
family being thus almost equally at home 
in the world-city and the provincial capital, 
this lady’s character was a product of two 
distinct yet sympathetic centres, and I can 
only attempt to show somewhat of the influ- 
ence of both by setting down a bit of her 
confidences to Mr. Langdon — and for that 
matter, to all the world; for this bright 
woman knew that she charmed people by 
her confidences. Her Spanish-French con- 
struction of sentences may possibly (though 
I doubt it) be conveyed or suggested in 
English. 

**Here are my last two youngest; I con- 
fide them to you, sir,” she said. ^‘My two 
oldest — if 'you knew how much those girls’ 
education cost me at the convent! And 
what good it do? They never learn any- 
thing for success in life. One of the sisters 
brings them from the convent in Castillejo. 
That was years ago, but I remember it like 
yesterday. 

“I say to Teresita, after I have embraced 
her, 'You glad to be home, my dear?’ 

" 'Yes, ma’am.’ 


137 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


‘‘Teresita she sit so straight, with her 
hands crossed — and she a young lady. 

‘You love me, Teresita?’ 

“ ‘Yes, ma’am.’ 

“I turn to Liseta. 

“ ‘Liseta, you hungry, my dear?’ 

“ ‘Yes, ma’am.’ And she make a long 
nose; she learn that at the convent. 

“Then the nun tell me I can ask them 
questions in any part of the catechism, and 
they can answer. 

“So I say: ‘Teresita, where’s Paris?’ 

“ ‘In France, ma’am.’ 

“Teresita, she know everything!’ ’’ 

The speaker, the banker’s wife, had 
never before troubled herself to ask where 
Paris was. 

“Teresita, she can tell you all the names 
of the cities in Australia and America; but 
what for, my professor? That doesn’t give 
Teresita success. You think, when she 
receive a gentleman in the drawing-room 
she say: ‘Washington is in this state, and 
California is the capital of some province or 
other?’ No, my friend, that doesn’t bring 
the success. 

“Then the nun tell me to ask Liseta to 
play the piano. Liseta, she sit down and 
138 


OTHER SCHOLARS 


she play bong, bong! — something serious, 
melancholy — Beethoven, Mozart — and I say 
to her: ‘Liseta, have pity! You make me 
cry!’ That was not to entertain the peo- 
ple. That was not education. 

^‘When did my Teresita and my Liseta 
get their education? When they went to 
Paris. At the theatre, at the opera bouffe, 
Liseta catch the airs by ear. She never 
play with the notes any more; she play 
something gay. And she pick up what she 
hear at the theatre to say to the gentlemen — 
something funny, something to make people 
laugh. Above all, she learn to dress. When 
she ride in the Bois, her shoes, her hats, 
all — perfection; and people say: ^That 
handsome Miss Liseta!’ Not one word 
about those cities and rivers in America. 
And, my professor, I pay all that money 
for those rivers in America; and Teresita 
she makes no success with those rivers in 
America. 

"‘One day a card is brought of a Russian 
gentleman my daughter has met at a ball, 
and we pass that card around, but nobody 
can pronounce the name. Teresita has not 
come downstairs yet. And I say to the 
company: ‘Wait till my daughter come 

139 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


down ; she knows how to pronounce every- 
thing. In the convent she have learn the 
names of all the rivers in America, with 
names like this!’ ” — measuring the names 
between plump hands, with confronting 
palms and polished nails on jeweled fingers 
bent backward. 

‘*And Teresita she come into the room 
at the same time with a Russian lady who 
calls on me. And I say to Teresita: ‘My 
dear, pronounce this Russian name!’ And 
the Russian lady say: ‘You know, our 
names are very difficult.’ But I say: 
‘ Excuse me ; she has learned all the names 
of the Indian rivers, and she can read every- 
thing.’ 

“I give the card to Teresita” — using the 
palm of her left hand as the card and show- 
ing how Teresita scrutinized it. 

“And Teresita she read the name out 
loud. She read aloud, and the Russian 
lady she laugh, laugh. And I say: ‘What’s 
the matter?’ 

“My professor, you see, Teresita don’t 
know how at all ! I spend all that money 
for those Indian names, and Teresita doesn’t 
know one!” 


140 


AI.CAZAR GARDEN 












XV 

The Vital Thing 

One day Mr. Langdon left friends and 
scholars behind and took a little journey 
alone to Cadiz. 

The train carried him through the heart 
of the sherry-wine district, and he was 
tempted to stop at the vineyards ; but as he 
had a letter of introduction addressed to a 
man named Verges, of Cadiz, he decided to 
present that first. 

At Cadiz, however, was no Sefior Verges 
with the proper initials ; the city directory 
did not contain the name, and the porter of 
the hotel at which Mr. Langdon alighted 
was at a loss. 

Presently the porter suggested looking in 
the appendix of the directory, where were 
lists of the inhabitants of neighboring towns ; 
and there, under the heading Puerto Santa 
Maria (Port St. Mary) stood the name that 
was written on the envelope. So, back 
again next morning went Mr. Langdon, 

141 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


along the gleaming shore, to Port St. Mary, 
on the northern side of the bay of Cadiz 
and the edge of the precious vinelands. 

When the air was full of jewels of light, 
Mr. Langdon went through the empty 
white main street of Port St. Mary until he 
came to Sefior Verges’s house. The master 
was not at home, he learned, but a man- 
servant would lead the way to Sefior 
Verges ’s bodega. 

His bodega! 

That was a pleasant word to hear. A 
bodega is a building used for storing large 
quantities of wine. 

So Verges had a bodega. 

The letter of introduction was approved, 
and the two men became host and guest. 
The host invited his guest to walk through 
the bodega. 

It was a walk. You must not think of a 
cellar choked with cobwebs and bottles. 
Think of a liberal building, the wine in a 
hundred enormous casks, each of which 
would fill a room : a cathedral dedicated to 
sherry, with a hundred chapels of curved 
oak ranged along its walls. Coming into 
its dimness from the marvelously brilliant 
sunshine, Mr. Langdon realized, as one 
142 


THE VITAL THING 


does when a thing has been taken away, 
that the jewels of light with which the outer 
air had been filled were like the picture one 
forms in the mind of the vital spark itself — 
the Essence of Life made visible. In the 
bodega the atmosphere seemed dead, but as 
they went about from one great tun to 
another, Mr. Langdon learned (through the 
ministrations of an attendant who carried a 
dipper and a dock-glass) where life was 
in hiding still, though the sun never entered 
there. Some of the wines he drank were 
dark as port, others might easily have been 
mistaken for Madeira, still others were 
nearly white, with a cool faint taste ; but all 
were sherries, all had come from the vine- 
yards he had seen from the train the day 
before. 

And so Mr. Langdon was led on from 
good to better until they came to a place of 
honor. 

This wine that I am now to offer,” said 
the host, ^‘has been in the cask for more 
than one hundred years.” He explained 
that sherries had to be blended as years 
passed, older wines being added to the 
younger, and younger to the older, like an 
infusion of new blood which does not change 
H3 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


the identity of the receiving body; “but, 
except for such manipulation/’ he said, 
filling a glass with the amber-colored liquid, 
“this is a wine of the last century;’’ and he 
gave an historical account of his treasure, and 
of the ancient firm of wine merchants, his 
predecessors — to which narration, although 
it would have been interesting at another 
moment, the guest paid little heed. He 
was drinking the wine. 

Sefior Verges afterward pressing him to 
taste other kinds of sherry, Mr. Langdon 
refused, for he would not consent to spoil 
the lingering aroma of that fabulous vintage. 

That was not merely the best of Spanish 
wine: that was Spain. 

When he told Gloria and Vincent and 
Anita about his trip to Cadiz, as they were 
sitting together in the Alcazar Garden, he 
said that to his palate the wine seemed to 
be made of delicious living creatures — each 
drop a thing separately alive — and that while 
Verges was recounting its history, he, for 
his part, was swallowing the essence of life, 
the vital spark, the very jewels of light that 
had fallen a hundred years before upon the 
vineyards of Xeres — deathless, bright things 

144 


THE VITAL THING 


embodied in the drops of the wine — “like 
the light and the dear vitality in Anita,” 
said Mr. Langdon — and said it to her! 

And, of all this wise man’s sayings, that 
was the wisest, when he declared that the 
sparkling atmosphere of Southern Spain, 
the good old wine, and pretty Anita had 
one charm among the three — the very same 
charm for each. 

Please think several times of this saying 
and once of the enchanting place in which 
it was said — where the vital light was deli- 
cately transmuted into gleaming and glow- 
ing blossom and fruit. 

When some one you like, with persuasion 
on her lips, sings, “I re-mem-ber an old 
gar-den,” and singing, with a full note for 
each dear, distinct syllable, lets music rest 
upon the thought ; when she turns from the 
keyboard to question you with her eyes, to 
see if you have a mental picture of the same 
old garden, the very same old garden and 
no other — why, then you two (bless you !) 
may have in mind a garden in Florida or a 
garden in Maine, but surely, surely, its 
shrubs, its vines, its leaves and its blades of 
grass have somewhat grown beyond the 

145 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


gardener’s prescriptive rule, his pruning- 
hook and his scythe. Surely there are some 
extravagant branches hanging low over the 
walks, some tufts of weed in the gravel. 
Such slight marks of passing time are needed 
to stir memory. Would Eden itself, if 
eternally trimmed and primmed, cut back 
and raked over, look like a genuine old gar- 
den? 

Not too prim, but indulgently allowed to 
look genuine, is the garden of the Alcazar 
at Seville. It is old, indeed, and judicious 
neglect makes it look so much older that 
when a gardener informs you that Peter 
the Cruel gathered fruit from the orange 
tree beneath which you stand, you say: 
“Of course; naturally.” 

At that hour and season, when the im- 
minent heat of summer had already driven 
others away from Seville, and was about to 
drive the Americans away also, Vincent and 
Gloria and Anita and Mr. Taswell Langdon 
(telling his story of the Vital Thing) were 
alone there, except for a young gardener, 
who, at a little distance, fixed hungry black 
eyes on the beauty of the women, and by 
his reverential attitude signified that at a 
146 


THE VITAL THING 


word he was ready to drop on all-fours and 
be their dog. 

After that day Seville was no longer a 
paradise. Such things as this were in the 
air: that presently one would be able to 
cook an egg by exposing it to the direct 
rays of the sun at noon in the Plaza de la 
Magdalena. 

I simply cannot tell how dry and hot it 
became, or how Vincent and Gloria longed 
for cool, wet things ; but I know that their 
next journey was made — by water, chiefly — 
in consequence of an interchange of sugges- 
tions effected almost without words. 

As they sat together Vincent thought 
about houses with refreshingly chilly and 
damp walls. 

Gloria cooled her fancy with memories of 
sedgy banks and sweet-flag bogs, and pond- 
lilies, and boots mildewed in a night. 

think,” said Vincent, “the most shiv- 
ery ghosts — ” 

“Delicious!” said Gloria. 

“Are in England,” Vincent concluded. 
And so they went to England. 


147 








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An English Interlude 







XVI 


The Scene Shifts to England 

Perhaps one does not always choose wife 
or husband from that group which in retro- 
spect seems to have been the most charming. 
At any rate, Mr. Langdon did not. He did 
not marry a woman of the Sevillian house- 
hold. But by their amiable contact the 
Spanish women must have unwittingly 
placed matrimony in an attractive light, 
and, thus predisposing him to its contagion, 
contributed to his conquest by Mrs. Upton, 
an Englishwoman. 

Mrs. Upton was always clever. Here is 
a letter she wrote several years ago, describ- 
ing her presentation at court. Let it serve 
as a presentation of her character to you. 

“My dress,” she wrote, “was of black 
velvet and gray brocaded satin, and I wore 
my heavy Indian necklace with the uncut 
gems. The hair-dresser came at 9 A.M. to 
do my hair over cushions and put in the 
necessary three feathers. I left the house 

151 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


at noon, fell into the ranks in St. James 
Park in front of Marlboro’ House, waited 
there without moving until two o’clock, 
and then proceeded slowly to Buckingham 
Palace. 

^‘On either side of the front hall were the 
Beef-Eaters» in their ugly costume. We 
left our cloaks in a large room, where a lot 
of old-fashioned women servants waited on 
us, then turned to the left, and before 
mounting some stairs were looked at to see 
if we had the regulation number of feathers, 
and whether they were sufficiently on the 
top of our heads. We then went along a 
corridor and through a large room into 
another room, where about one hundred 
chairs were set like stalls in a theatre. 
About one hundred of us were let in, the 
Beef- Eaters barricading us up like sheep in 
a pen. 

‘‘In front of us was another room, filled 
in a similar manner with ladies who had 
come earlier, and the room behind us was 
also filled by ladies, who had to stand. After 
waiting about an hour and a half, we were 
moved into another room, where we sat 
half an hour. Then fifty of us at a time 
were moved into a smaller room, where 


152 


SCENE SHIFTS TO ENGLAND 


there were no chairs. Looking through a 
passage, we could see the people who had 
already been presented. 

Here twenty of us were let through the 
bariiers, and found ourselves in a little mir- 
ror-room with a lot of swells in magnificent 
uniforms who spread out our trains for us ; 
and then we walked alone, one by one, 
into a sort of passage, while the Lord Cham- 
berlain shouted out our names very dis- 
tinctly. 

took three steps forward and found 
myself in the presence of a tired and sleepy 
personage, who was sitting down. She put 
out her hand for me to kiss. 

‘‘Now, just think a moment! Think 
what I had gone through between an unus- 
ually early breakfast and this late hour in 
the afternoon; and think what I was ex- 
pected to do when the Queen put out her 
hand. 

“I was expected to courtesy very low, 
kiss the Queen's hand, courtesy to a brace 
of Princesses standing near (who would re- 
spond with jerky bows) and then try to make 
the regulation number of other courtesies 
while I backed out almost to the door; there 
to have another swell, acting as lackey, fold 

153 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 

my train in my arm, and be hustled out 
before I had time to breathe; to be run 
through another door into another corridor, 
down other stairs and back into the same 
cloak-room ; then to be driven home as soon 
as my carriage came up. I was expected to 
admire the hideous decorations of the rooms 
at Buckingham Palace, and not to care to 
look at the pictures, some of which seemed 
to be interesting, or to stop to enjoy a 
glimpse of the garden at the back, which was 
very green and quite like the country, with 
ducks on the lake and ... I was expected 
to find diamonds impressive by daylight, 
and, although I was faint with hunger, not 
to mind the overpowering odor of the huge 
bouquets of sweet-smelling flowers which 
nearly every one carried. (For my part, I 
left my bouquets outside with my coachman 
and footman, and I carried a large feather fan 
instead.) I was expected not to notice that 
the Queen’s chair was very low — temptingly 
low and comfortable-looking; so low that 
a dibutante in stooping to kiss the royal 
hand might accidentally lose her balance 
and fall into the royal lap ; or, if she did it 
with design, it might appear to be accidental, 
did it! 


154 


SCENE SHIFTS TO ENGLAND 

seemed too delightfully refreshing for 
anything. It made up for all the stupid 
pomp of the dullest day of my life. To see 
the agony of a few dowdy old women; to 
receive the agile assistance of an electri- 
fied lord-in-waiting (who laughed with me 
about it afterward); to feel the Queen’s 
knees nestle me in toward her, with the true 
mother’s instinct, instead of letting me slide 
to the floor, as Queen Elizabeth would have 
done. I assure you it was a delicious in- 
stant.” 


XVII 


Mrs. Upton and the Ghosts at St. 
John’s House 

The writer of the foregoing letter had been 
one of Mr. Taswell Langdon’s good friends 
before she became Mrs. Upton. During 
the brief period of her married life and two 
years of widowhood, this friendship had 
been maintained, thopgh chiefly by corre- 
spondence. Now, it so happened that when' 
Mr. Langdon fled before the heat of sum- 
mer in Seville and found himself in Lon- 
don, he received from Mrs. Upton several 
letters, dated at St. John’s House, War- 
wick, in which the young widow described 
her surroundings at the time of writing with 
more than usual zest. We have only to 
piece together certain portions of these 
letters in order to have a description of St. 
John’s House in her own vivid language. 

*‘If you have ever been in Warwick,” she 
wrote, “you must have seen St. John’s 
House. It stands back from the street in 
156 


ST. JOHN’S HOUSE 














' 


t 




. 9 







I 



% 



GHOSTS AT ST. JOHN’S HOUSE 

its own grounds, between the Avon and the 
road that leads to the castle from the sta- 
tion. You must pass it also on the way to 
or from Leamington. When I came here 
in July with my dear old servant — the one I 
still call nurse — we first stopped at the 
Woolpack Hotel, but as there was no gar- 
den and I did not like being among tourists 
all the time, I soon set out with nurse to 
find rooms elsewhere. Nurse said that on 
the way from the station she had noticed a 
very fine, large, old-fashioned house, which 
had a board like a sign-post in the garden 
advertising ^apartments.’ This sounded 
promising, so we went into a pastry-cook’s 
shop to inquire our way. The shopkeeper 
told us where to go, and added, with a 
rather quizzical expression, that the house 
was kept by two Miss Whins. 

shall never forget my first look into 
the garden. Such an old-fashioned place! 
Even then, in broad daylight, I felt a kind 
of shiver steal over me. We walked up the 
wide, neglected path and knocked at the 
door, which was opened by a very stout old 
woman. She asked us in and begged me 
to sit down until she called her sister, ‘who 
always attended to the business part,’ as 

157 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


she expressed it ; then hobbled away goutily, 
crying, or rather snorting: ‘Eliza Whin! 
Eliza 1 Eliza Whin 1’ I scarcely knew which 
to look at hardest, this fat person with the 
oddest cap I ever saw, or the quaint dining- 
hall we had been ushered into. It was a 
very large square room, the stained floor of 
which was partly covered with a fine old 
rug. The walls were hung with tapestry, 
but the only furniture was an oblong table 
of oak in the centre, a huge sideboard, and 
several chairs. Although it was early in a 
bright summer afternoon, the hall was 
gloomy, for the lattice windows admitted 
but little light. A faint musty odor hung 
about the place. Nurse said it looked like 
a room where ladies and gentlemen used to 
say ‘belly.’ I felt enchanted with it all, 
for I seemed to have stepped into the fif- 
teenth century of a sudden. 

“Presently there entered a little woman 
with a wrinkled face, short gray hair, and 
nervous hands, dressed in the fashion of fifty 
years ago — like an illustration in a back 
number of some ladies’ magazine. She did 
not see us at first, but kept looking about 
as though the room were empty. Finally, 


158 


GHOSTS AT ST. JOHN’S HOUSE 

with a ^Good afternoon,’ accompanied by a 
half-courtesy, she invited us to follow her. 

‘ ‘ We went through a narrow passage which 
led to the foot of a staircase. A very odd 
staircase indeed! It was of black oak, it 
was winding, at every few steps it had a 
landing, and at every landing a door. 
Where in the world did all these doors lead? 
We were only going up to the first floor; 
now, pray, what business had so many doors 
between the ground floor and the first? 
Another passage led to the rooms which 
Miss Eliza Whin offered me, and even these 
were not all on the same level, for the one 
on the right had three steps leading up to 
it. This we entered, and found it large and 
dim, though with a window at either end, 
one looking on the driveway and the 
other on the kitchen garden. A big four- 
post bedstead was in the centre, and again 
doors at every side. One of these I tried 
and could not open, when my guide ex- 
plained that it led into another part of the 
house, but had not been unlocked for years. 
^ There were four separate staircases in St. 
John’s House,’ she added, as though that 
accounted for any number of doors with 


159 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


rusty locks. This apartment, she thought, 
would do for little old nurse. 

‘^For myself, she suggested the room she 
next showed us, which was very much larger 
than the first, and contained the largest bed 
I have ever seen, with eight curtains of yel- 
low damask. Here the enormous lattice 
window with wrought-iron fastenings over- 
looked the grounds in front of the house. 
A suspicious door was here also; and this is 
the door you shall presently hear about. My 
future landlady informed me that this also 
was always locked, the room on the other 
side containing ‘nothing but antiquities,’ 
which were exhibited to the public on pay- 
ment of a shilling. 

Between the two bedrooms (nurse’s and 
mine) was a sitting-room, extending from 
the front of the house to the rear, so that 
one of its windows looked out on the street, 
and the other on the near River Avon. In 
the centre hung a glass chandelier with 
eight branches, which gave promise of much 
light on the dingy walls and the somber old 
portraits of Miss Whin’s relatives, turning 
their eyes in all directions with austere 
scrutiny of our doings as we moved about. 
There was also a portrait of Lord Brooke, 
i6o 


GHOSTS AT ST. JOHN’S HOUSE 


whom Miss Eliza seemed to consider as a 
member of her family, because he had once 
been her father’s pupil and had remained 
their constant friend. 

‘'Then she told me that St. John’s House 
belonged to the Earl of Warwick, who had 
given the use of it to her sister and herself 
for their lives, as their father had lived there 
and kept a school there for many years, and 
had been the young lord’s tutor. ‘The 
ancient building, ’ she went on, repeating a 
sentence she had learned by heart, ‘was 
founded about the year 1175 by William de 
Newburgh, as a monastery dedicated to St. 
John the Baptist; was afterward occupied 
by the Knights Templar; still later by the 
Knights of St. John of Jerusalem; in the 
fifteenth century and subsequently was 
transformed into a residence for gentlemen’s 
families, and finally came into the hands of 
the Earl of Warwick.’ 

“I decided to take immediate possession, 
but first I asked: ‘Are there any other 
lodgers?’ 

“ ‘Not at present.’ 

“ ‘Then there is no one else in the 
house?’ 

“ ‘No, indeed!’ 

161 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 

** Ht is not haunted?’ 

*‘This last question I asked half-jestingly, 
but the little woman became quite indignant 
at the suggestion and replied that such a 
thing had never been heard of. It was not 
exactly reassuring to find her so touchy on 
this subject; still, I engaged the rooms and 
returned to the hotel for our luggage with 
only pleasant thoughts of our new home 
and feeling that it was quite a privilege to 
live in a house with such a history. An 
hour later we were comfortably installed. 
A fire was burning cheerfully in the sitting- 
room ; the grim portraits looked down at us . 
more approvingly. 

‘^As the day was closing in, I strolled 
about in the beautiful old garden like one 
in a dream. A high stone wall, covered 
with ripening fruit, hid the town from view. 
Only the towers of Warwick Castle could 
be seen above it on that side, while on the 
other side were broad green meadows that 
sloped down to the Avon. 

‘‘Turning a corner of the house I came 
upon the smallest of the Miss Whins and a 
small servant going into what seemed to be 
a cellar. The maid held a lantern, and lit- 
tle Miss Whin was about to put her flat 
162 


GHOSTS AT ST. JOHN’S HOUSE 

little foot on the threshold when she turned 
and saw me. 

“ ‘You must have a fine store-room there, ’ 
I said. 

“ ‘Yes,' she answered, ‘finer than one 
would think. Would you care to look at 
it?' 

“Being eager to see every part of the 
place, I assented. She walked first with 
the lantern, holding it high above her head ; 
but this light was too feeble, while the floor 
of the passage we had entered was very 
rough, and cobwebs hung in festoons from 
the low, vaulted ceiling. After having gone 
on for a rod or so, I stopped, and remarked 
that it seemed to be a long way. The lit- 
tle woman turned and faced me, holding the 
lantern so that its light shone on one side 
of her face with a ghastly effect. Her mo- 
tions were so wooden, her dress so odd, her 
long, white cap-strings hung in such a limp 
fashion, that I could not help thinking of 
departed nuns. An odd little feeling began 
to creep over me as she told me that we 
were in an underground passage leading to 
Warwick Castle, or, as some said, to Kenil- 
worth. She looked so uncanny that I 
wondered if she had never married because, 
163 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


perhaps, she was courted by the spirits of 
departed monks and dared not wed the liv- 
ing. 

^‘Such were my first impressions of Miss 
Eliza Whin, ‘who attended to the business 
part.’ Miss Ellen, ‘who attended to the 
cooking part/ amused me more than her 
sister, for Miss Ellen gives such a funny lit- 
tle wink and a toss of her head in speaking. 
She also has clothes dating about fifty years 
back, but her costume, I regret to say, is 
less neat than Miss Eliza’s, and her cap 
looks as though she had stolen it from a 
monkey or had had it made for a fancy 
dress ball many years ago and forgotten to 
take it off ever since, only making the sur- 
rounding hair very smooth with some kind 
of grease each morning. Imagine a cap in 
the shape of a doughnut, made of black vel- 
vet and dull beads and worn very much on 
one side! 

“At about eleven o’clock each morning I 
call on her in the kitchen to give the orders 
for the day. She makes an attempt to rise 
when I enter, but, being too fat, gives it up 
and settles herself to listen, playing a fan- 
dango with her fingers on the nearest table, 
to signify that she is all attention. At my 

164 


GHOSTS AT ST. JOHN’S HOUSE 


first words the scullery-maid, Mary, turns 
upon us with her mouth wide open, and in 
this attitude continues to stare until I have 
finished ; then shuts her mouth with a snap 
and goes on with her work as though noth- 
ing had happened. If Miss Ellen catches 
her behaving in this way, with a majestic 
wave of the hand she motions to Mary, 
whose mouth closes at the signal. Miss 
Ellen, you see, respects herself. Some- 
times, with many winks and sighs from her 
heavy chest, she tells me of days gone by 
when she and her sister used to ‘flit’ upon 
the lawn in white muslin gowns. The mere 
idea of Miss Ellen flitting is so droll that it 
is with difficulty that I keep a straight face ; 
but I am sure Miss Ellen herself cherishes 
the hope of flitting again at some future 
day. She regards her surroundings, even 
in the kitchen, *as rather remarkable than 
otherwise, and will point with a greasy fork 
to a fine oak sideboard, despoiled of its 
brass handles, and toss her head to show 
that she looks upon such old curiosities as 
mere nothings to herself, although import- 
ant to the rest of the world. 

“ ‘Good morning. Miss Ellen,’ I say, on 
entering the kitchen. 

1^5 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


“ ‘And good morning to you, Mrs. 
Upton.’ 

“ ‘Miss Ellen, I thought I would send in 
a nice duck for dinner. I wonder whether 
you can dress it as I like it.’ 

“She smacks her lips, and her fingers turn 
to imaginary duck-stuffing as she answers: 
‘Oh, yes, indeed! A bit of passely, an idea 
of onion, may happen a roasted biscuit or 
two — a nice sass,’ and she ends with a 
knowing wink. 

“ ‘Fruit to be found in the market, I 
suppose. Miss Ellen?’ 

“ ‘Heaps, heaps, heaps; but our garden 
is so full that we will supply you most 
readily any time.’ This sounds like the 
ofifer of fruit and friendship. 

“ ‘That will be nice. Miss Ellen.’ 

“‘Oh! yes; I will tell the gardener to 
knock down some Victoria plums from the 
south wall for luncheon.’ 

“As I go away after this gracious talk, I 
hear her calling ‘James! James!’ Now, 
James is her brother, and she knows that I 
know it, so she does not mean to deceive 
me in calling him the gardener. That is 
just her harmless way of trying to be grand. 

“At first we were not much troubled by 

i66 


GHOSTS AT ST. JOHN’S HOUSE 

ghosts, although at night when the moon 
would shine on the great trees on the lawn 
I would seem to see misty shadows flit (to 
borrow Miss Whin’s word) from time to 
time among them; and, after I had gone 
to bed and drawn all the eight yellow dam- 
ask curtains close, strange sounds would be 
heard, as though monks were softly passing 
to and fro in the long corridors, telling their 
beads. 

‘‘Three days after my arrival Miss Eliza 
showed me the room adjoining mine and 
separated, as I have said, by a door which 
was always locked. As though to empha- 
size the fact that this door was securely 
locked, she did not try to open it, but led 
me downstairs and then up again by a dif- 
ferent flight to the room in question. It 
was really an interesting old place, like a 
curiosity shop in perfect order; yet I could 
not help noticing that the various articles 
of furniture were placed as though actually 
in use, and that was rather a ghostly sug- 
gestion. Tapestry representing a black 
Queen of Sheba and a negroid Cleopatra, 
with a yellow Solomon and a brown 
Antony, covered the walls; ther6 were 
some very fine old carved chairs and tables, 
167 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


a spinet, odd-looking oak chests, and valu- 
able bits of old china, with other more 
ordinary furniture. The lattice windows 
admitted but little light, and as Miss Whin 
led me before a curtain which hung across 
the door of a closet, I was obliged to screw 
up my eyes to see what was in front of me. 
She laughed as she put her hand on the 
curtain and said she would show me the 
only inhabitant of the room and the guar- 
dian of the house. Then she drew aside 
the curtain, and I — screamed. 

“There in his cell sat a monk, leaning over 
a table on which were a metal lamp and a 
crucifix. It was the most natural looking 
figure, not a bit more wooden in appearance 
than Miss Eliza herself. This, then, was 
the image of Miss Eliza’s ghostly lover, I 
thought; and just then, as though she knew 
what was passing in my brain, she said : ‘He 
never wakes at night and walks, so don’t be 
startled.’ But I confess that the thought 
of having these exceedingly odd things in 
the room next to mine was anything but 
pleasant. 

“A few days after this I went downstairs 
as usual to give my orders for dinner and so 
forth. It being just a week since our arrival, 

i68 


GHOSTS AT ST. JOHN^S HOUSE 


I wanted to pay the accounts, and said so 
to Miss Ellen; but she greeted me with 
many winks and nods, saying: ^No hurry, 
no hurry, Mrs. Upton; not the least in the 
world,’ quite as though I had been owing 
her for months and she was an amiable land- 
lady. ‘And besides,’ she added, ‘you must 
please have these little business affairs with 
my sister. She, being a teacher, you know’ 
(I had not heard of that before) ‘always 
attends to that part, and I, as you see, 
superintend the house.’ While speaking 
she was superintending the house by sitting 
almost on top of the fire and stirring some- 
thing in an iron pot. It was hard not to 
laugh, but I kept a grave face and asked if 
I might see her sister. 

“ ‘I do not know,’ she said, ‘but will see. 
I fear, however, that the school is in at les- 
sons.’ With some difficulty she got upon 
her feet, walked across the room, and 
knocked at a door that I had never before 
noticed. I was much surprised to learn 
that there was a school in the house, never 
having seen any sign of such a thing, and I 
did not like finding that new door. It 
seemed as though I was always finding new 
-doors. 


169 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


“In answer to Miss Ellen’s knock Miss 
Eliza appeared, with an angry look on her 
face, and reproved her sister for ‘knocking 
at the school-room door during study hours.’ 
But on seeing me and learning my errand 
she changed her expression and invited me 
to enter, which I did, looking around 
me for the school-children. I could only 
see one miserably thin little girl about seven 
years of age, sitting at a very old dirty 
desk. Her face almost touched her copy- 
book, and she seemed to be writing with her 
tongue as much as with the pencil. 

“ ‘I will just send the school out of doors 
for a little fresh air and attend to you, Mrs. 
Upton, at once,’ said Miss Eliza. Turning 
to the child, she observed in a very serious 
way, ‘The school may go out and run a 
bit;’ at which words the little creature gave 
a ghostly smile and stole shyly away, after 
putting up her heavy stained old books into 
the stained old desk. When she had gone 
Miss Eliza remarked to me that it was a 
fine day. 

“ ‘Yes,’ I said; ‘and it will do that child 
good to get out of doors. Have you many 
other scholars?’ 

“ ‘No,’ Miss Eliza answered, ‘I have only 
170 


GHOSTS AT ST. JOHN’S HOUSE 

Kate, as you saw. She lives with us, you 
know. ' 

‘‘It was too absurd! The school, then, 
consisted of this one little girl. Many times 
since I have seen ‘the school’ disporting 
her thin legs on the lawn in a spectral 
attempt to play nineteenth century games 
in a sixteenth century garden. 

“Now you know the people who are 
always here, and I shall end the list with a 
sewing- woman who comes to St. John’s 
House now and then to work on my dresses. 
Her name is Huckings(she says ‘Uckings’), 
and she is a plump person about thirty 
years old, with the heart of a child. One 
day she startled me by asking whether I 
was not afraid of stopping at St. John’s. 
I said ‘no,’ but began to feel rather queer 
as I asked her why I should be afraid. 

“ ‘Oh,’ she answered, ‘because they do 
say as ’ow it’s ’aunted, Mrs. Upton.’ 

“ ‘In what way?’ 

“ ‘There be ’eaps of stories as ’ow the 
boys, them as used to be at school ’ere in 
the ’ouse, says their prayers backward at 
midnight, and the monks do walk about so 
light’ (as though they were in procession 
before us) — ‘so light you ’ardly ’ear them.’ 

171 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


** ‘But, Huckings, the Miss Whins deny 
that the house is haunted at all, and as they 
have lived here for more than half a century 
they ought to know.’ 

“ ‘Oh, dear,’ she replied, mildly, ‘they 
would not give hin to it, don’t you see, 
Mrs. Upton, for the reputation of the ’ouse 
would be ruined, like, as would n^ever do 
for letting apartments. And some in the 
town do say as ’ow Miss Whins are friends, 
like, with the ghosts, and set hup at night 
a-laughing and a-joking of them.’ 

“ ‘Huckings!’ I said, ‘you frighten me 
almost to death.’ 

“ ^\hain sorry, mum’ (she looked alarmed 
in reality) ‘if I ’ave made you feel uncom- 
fortable; but, if I do say it, I would not 
live ’ere did they pay me hever so much. 
It must be ’orrid at night’ (with a visible 
shiver). ‘On New Year’s eve the monks 
sing in chorus so loud as you can ’ear them 
from the gates yonder.’ 

“ ‘This is awful,’ I said; still I was fas- 
cinated and begged her to go on — which she 
did with a vengeance, telling me of a lady 
for whom she used to sew in the same suite 
of apartments, who was obliged to move, as 
the monks were rude enough to pull aside 
172 


GHOSTS AT ST. JOHN’S HOUSE 


the bed curtains one night and laugh at her. 
The lady objected to this performance, 
partly because she could see the lining of 
the back of their black robes by looking at 
their belts, which was all very transparent, 
airy and unique, but unpleasant. 

‘The monks steals hup and down stairs,’ 
Huckings continued, ‘at about hevening 
meal-time, with flasks of wine under their 
harms, going to and from the cellar, you 
know, ’m, just as they hused to; and that 
is why mother will always come to fetch 
me ’ome.’ 

“The most amusing feature of Huckings’ 
stories is that she speaks as though she her- 
self had lived many centuries ago, and had 
seen and known intimately all the things 
and people she tells me about, or as though 
these people might at any time be met 
walking in the streets of Warwick. ‘Do 
you know Guy’s Cliff, mum?’ she once 
asked me. (Guy’s Cliff, you know, is only 
a mile or so from St. John’s.) ‘Is it not 
just like the hold stories, Mrs. Upton, and 
would you believe it could have kept so 
well? 

“ ‘It was built, oh, now let me see’ 
(thinking profoundly) ‘eight' or seven cen- 

173 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


turies ago — I forget which. And I do so 
like that real story about it, Mrs. Upton.’ 

*What is the story, Huckings?’ 

*Oh! don’t you know about Sir Guy 
and Fair Phyllis? You must know it, Mrs. 
Upton, honly as ’ow you ’ave forgotten it, 
maybe. Why, Fair Phyllis was a beautiful 
young lady, very slender, with a fine figure 
and ’air that was so fair — you can ’ardly be- 
lieve ’ow fair it was, Mrs. Upton. Her heyes 
were blue and her skin was as white as 
this dress, and that was why she was called 
Fair Phyllis, you see. Sir Guy ’e lived in 
the neighborhood. ’E was a Warwick, you 
know, Mrs. Upton; but ’e was such a 
monster! ’E was that tall, if you met ’im 
in the street you couldn’t ’elp but take 
notice of ’im. It seems as ’ow ’e took a 
great fancy to Fair Phyllis, and she just 
couldn’t abide ’im, for hall ’e said to ’er; 
but anyway she married ’im, and, do you 
know, Mrs. Upton, they ’ad not been mar- 
ried long before ’e went away from ’er 
because ’e couldn’t ’elp seeing her dislike. 
Well, it nearly broke ’is ’art to go, but ’e 
did. I call that real brave, now, don’t you, 
Mrs. Upton? And as ’e was going she 
gave ’im a ring and told ’im as ’ow ’e was 


GHOSTS AT ST. JOHN’S HOUSE 


to send it ’er if hever ’e was very bad. She 
staid and lived in that grand old place, 
Guy’s Cliff. But ’e loved ’ er so much ’e 
could not go far, so ’e ’id ’imself in a great, 
large rock with honly one faithful servant, 
and would slide hout at night and go to 
peep at the Fair Phyllis when she wasn’t 
looking. You see I am honly giving you 
the hidea, like, Mrs. Upton. Any ’ow ’e 
did ’ave a bad turn, and thought as ’ow ’e 
was going to die; so ’e sent ’is man- 
servant to Fair Phyllis with the ring, which 
brought ’er quicker nor you would ’ave 
thought, for she ’ad been growing fond of 
’im in the meantime, do you see, Mrs. 
Upton; and she fetched ’im away to Guy’s 
Cliff and nursed ’im until ’e died, taking 
such good care of ’im.’ 

‘^She paused for a little, and then con- 
cluded with that inevitable ‘They do say 'is 
ghost is ’overing about still. ’ 

“Such simple faith is delightful, you may 
say; but what will you say when I tell you 
that I myself have become equally supersti- 
tious? Such is the truth, I must confess. 
Listen ! 

“One afternoon, at about three o’clock, I 
went into my room and prepared to lie 

175 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


down and make myself comfortable for an 
hour or so with a book. I was standing by 
the sofa, spreading a shawl, when I was 
startled by the sound of dripping water. 
Turning my head in the direction of the 
sound, I saw a tumbler of water which was 
on the washstand, about eight feet from 
me, lean gradually over, letting the water 
run out until it was quite empty, and then 
quietly stand back again in place as though 
it had not moved. It was as though an 
invisible hand had turned it, and I gave a 
piercing shriek, which, however, brought 
nobody, for the house seemed to be 
deserted. A few minutes later I was 
ashamed of myself and ready to disbelieve 
my eyes; but there was the empty glass in 
its place, and the water spilled over the 
washstand and dripping to the floor. 

“Again, yesterday evening, I was still 
more thoroughly startled. It was about 
six o’clock, and I was dressing for dinner, 
with nurse to help me, when I happened to 
look toward the door leading into the 
^tapestry room’ — for so I call the adjoining 
room with the figure of St. John, the 
antique furniture, and tapestry representing 
Cleopatra and the Queen of Sheba. I 
176 


GHOSTS AT ST. JOHN’S HOUSE 


thought there was an eye peering in at me. 
I screamed and ran to nurse, pointing at the 
door and crying, 'Look, nurse, there is 
some stranger in the tapestry room who is 
looking in here through the keyhole!’ She 
did not see the eye, as it vanished at my 
scream; but a moment afterward she ran to 
the door and covered the keyhole with her 
hand, saying: 'It is there again, mum. I 
never saw such impertinence!’ I said in a 
loud voice, for the benefit of the intruder: 
'Call to Miss Whin, nurse, and ask her to 
have it stopped;’ then, making a great ef- 
fort, I went to the door, pushed aside nurse’s 
hand, put my head to the keyhole, and met 
the eye at close quarters. It was intensely 
black and perhaps rather unnaturally round, 
as though the lid had been drawn back by a 
finger. I began beating at the door with 
my hands, crying indignantly: 'Miss Whin, 
will you be kind enough to request your 
visitors not to look into my room?’ But no 
answer came. In fact, I had by this time 
noticed that there had been no noise in the 
room, as there certainly would have been if 
visitors had come in to see the old furniture. 

"My next thought was that the intruder 
might be a thief, and I hurried on my dress- 
177 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


ing-gown and flew downstairs. There, in 
the kitchen, I found both the Miss Whins, 
the school, and one maid, while the other 
maid was in sight, washing clothes in the 
courtyard, and the only remaining occupant 
of St. John’s, the gardener, was bringing 
in a basketful of famous green gooseberries. 
The Miss Whins rose hurriedly when I told 
them what I had seen, although they pro- 
tested that it must be a mistake, as they 
themselves had the keys to the upper and 
lower doors of that part of the building, 
and no one had been there since noon. 

‘^But while this protestation was going on 
we also were moving forward, the maids, 
the Misses Whin, their gardener-brother, 
the school, and I, and presently we reached 
the door at the foot of the stairs which led 
to the tapestry room. This door was 
locked and bolted on the outside. The 
fastenings undone, we were soon on our way 
up, finding each door locked, and every- 
thing in the tapestry room itself undisturbed. 
Then I was obliged to admit that no one 
could have escaped from such a secure place 
in so short a time. In blank amazement I 
looked at the Misses Whin, the gardener, 
the maids and the school. 

178 


GHOSTS AT ST. JOHN’S HOUSE 


‘‘ ‘It was the ghost of St. John,’ I said, 
and took to my heels — which is a hard 
thing to do when one is wearing French 
slippers. 

“I fled along the way we had come until 
I had escaped from the sound of their 
laughter — most disquieting and mirthless 
laughter, I thought it. 

“But such disquieting and mirthless 
laughter seemed to fill the house. It fol- 
lowed me along the hallway and up the 
winding staircase to my own quarters ; and 
at each of the innumerable doors I passed 
it seemed to come from within, and the 
round black eye seemed to peer at me from 
the walls. I was glad when at last I 
reached my own room, where I found nurse 
stuffing up the keyhole with paper.’’ 


179 


XVIII 

The Match-Making Ghosts 

“If I were not too ugly for any fine 
woman to look at!” cried Mr, Langdon, 
when he had read these letters. 

Presently he added, “And too poor!” 

Then he read them through once more. 

“Very long, and most carefully written,” 
he commented. “Must have taken hours. 
Now, why should she give up hours of her 
time to me? I know that I should not be 
likely to do such a thing for anybody — 
unless, of course, I happened to be in love 
with my correspondent. But, then, she is 
so different. That’s the trouble; there are 
so many points of difference between us. 
A poor, plain old bachelor is no match for 
this brilliant and handsome widow. Pshaw ! 
I have seen a peacock spread his tail after 
he has been moulting and has only three or 
four feathers left — spreading those four 
feathers ridiculously. That is the way I’d 
look if I should try to attract Hilda Upton. 
i8o 


THE MATCH-MAKING GHOSTS 


But what an irresistible description she has 
made! It does seem as though she must 
have wanted me to come.” 

Thus Mr. Langdon at London was 
engaged in a conflict with new but not 
wholly disagreeable emotions. Inclination 
said: ‘^Go to Warwick immediately;” his 
habitual diffidence prompted : 'Ht would do 
no good. I might as well stay here and 
read.” And habit would have prevailed, no 
doubt, if it had not been for the ghosts. 

‘‘But that is too absurd, you know — 
about those ghosts,” said Mr. Langdon to 
himself, as he began to pack. “I really 
ought to go. It is almost a duty. And I 
intend when I arrive to point out some 
natural explanation of the strange sights 
and sounds.” 

As though he would have a chance to 
point out things! Mrs. Upton took care 
of that. She drove him along the most 
beautiful roads in the Midland counties, 
between fields where yokels were “pay- 
pucking” (picking peas); by quiet streams, 
where one angler would call out to another, 
“’Arry, ’ere’s yure rud” (Harry, here is 
your rod), to the delight of her philologist. 
And think what alluring opportunities for 

i8i 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


research she suggested to her student of his- 
tory and literature when she told him that 
at one period, perhaps in the sixteenth cen- 
tury, the inferior portions of St. John’s 
House were used for the reception and 
entertainment of poor travelers — i. e., ped- 
dlers and jugglers and mountebanks and 
such people, who might happen to be over- 
taken by night outside of the city walls and 
after the city gates were closed. This 
merriest class in all England, when England 
was most merry, could find shelter in the 
extra-mural home of the holy order of St. 
John, so hither they came and cracked their 
rough jokes and sang their songs. St. 
John’s House may therefore have been a 
kind of tavern during the years which 
young Will Shakespeare passed, a few miles 
lower on the Avon, studying low life at the 
Stratford pot-houses. It is just an easy 
walk from Stratford-on-Avon to Warwick- 
on-Avon ; so the merry tinker who at noon 
emptied his tankard of home-brewed and 
sang his songs in the poet’s company, may 
at night have brawled and roared the same 
verses here in the cellar of St. John’s 
House. 

‘H only wish I might hear St. John sing 
182 


THE MATCH-MAKING GHOSTS 


those verses,” cried Mr. Langdon. '‘I 
have so often wondered what tunes they 
were set to; and I am persuaded that some 
of Shakespeare’s clowns’ songs, which are 
dull reading, were inserted just because 
they had a wondrous merry fetching air that 
sang itself and dragged the heavy words into 
favor. ’ ’ 

‘ ‘ Perhaps you will hear those songs some 
night,” said Mrs. Upton, quite gravely. 

‘^Oh, well, of course, I didn’t mean just 
that,” he explained. 

*‘You don’t believe in the ghost of St. 
John, or in any ghosts whatever?” Mrs. 
Upton asked, still more gravely. 

”Oh, no!” said Mr. Langdon. 

That, however, was in the afternoon. He 
had the most agreeable reason to change 
his opinion in the course of the evening. 

Now, let us go, as softly as the spectral 
monks themselves, into the room where he 
is sitting, late at night, and let us read his 
thoughts. 

''I intended when I arrived to point 
out some natural explanation of the strange 
sights and sounds’ ’ — thus his thoughts 
may be expressed. ''She, however, showed 
no interest in the explanations I offered. 
183 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


She seems positively to like the mystery 
and to like surrendering herself to it in my 
company, taking me to see the suspected 
places after dark yesterday evening and 
again to-night, and inviting me to use her 
sitting-room, as I am now doing, instead 
of going downstairs to my own ; for she was 
so kind as to say she felt more secure when 
she had me within call. 

don’t believe she would have asked 
me to stay here unless she had been much 
frightened by what occurred just now. 
There we were in the garden together, 
watching the effects of light and shade, as 
the moon gradually rose above St. John’s, 
when she suddenly clutched my arm with 
one hand and with the other pointed to the 
window of this room in which I am now 
sitting. 

‘Do you see it? There! there!' 

“ ‘No,’ I was obliged to confess, ‘I see 
nothing in particular;’ but I was heartily 
glad her eyes were sharper than mine, for 
in her fear she kept her hand on my arm 
and let me support her in a position which 
I should have thought quite impossible. I 
never dared to hope for such luck. It is 


184 


THE MATCH-MAKING GHOSTS 


easier to believe in the ghosts than to believe 
I am really so lucky. 

“It appears she saw a figure, like the 
figure of St. John, pass behind this window, 
or saw a shadow from the waving masses of 
ivy that hang above this window — no mat- 
ter which. At any rate, she seemed 
unnerved, and leaned heavily on me and 
spoke to me in a delightfully confidential 
whisper as we went toward the house, and 
said good night in a lingering way. 

“Now, what is the meaning of all this? 
It is surely incredible that a fine woman 
should take so much trouble for me — should 
care for me.” 

We realize that a thing is incredible when 
we are asked to believe in it ; so Mr. Lang- 
don was finally aware that he had been 
invited to believe that Mrs. Upton cared for 
him. But he could not bear to put it so 
plainly as this to himself. Rethought: “I 
might make this matter of ghosts the sub- 
ject of a good deal of study — a great deal 
of study.” 


185 







In Italy 



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XIX 

Italian Courtesy 

Less than nineteen hundred years ago, 
but nearer the time of Christ’s death than 
of our life to-day, a Latin baby took her 
first walk in the open air, out and away 
under the olive trees that surrounded her 
father’s house. It was the earliest warm 
day of her second year. ^‘The ground was 
so dry now,” her nurse had said — saying 
this in corrupt Latin — ‘‘that Naia might be 
allowed to put in practice the lessons she 
had received when, in-doors, through the 
inclement months that had passed, she 
balanced on incautious legs.” So nurse 
and Naia went out together, prattling cor- 
rupt Latin, both of them, but one with a 
babyish difference; and they went hand in 
hand, until, in a moment when the nurse’s 
hand relaxed its slight grasp, Naia started 
away alone in her earliest freedom, for her 
first adventure, with her first self-assertion ; 
doing with joy unspeakable the first thing 
189 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


she had ever done, having all the world be- 
fore her, for her own sake ; all her kindling 
desire carrying her out among these things 
so wholly new, so entrancing; away, until 
she fell — beating heart and flushed cheek 
pressed against the warm bosom of the 
earth. 

There was only one experience more 
beautiful than this in Naia’s life. That 
was when the story of Christ’s life came to 
her, years afterward. The story which was 
against all authority come from the center 
of persecution, stealing its way along, insist- 
ing that it should be heard, yet fearful lest 
it should be overheard, bringing a deadly 
message of freedom. The slave woman 
who had led Naia out under the olive trees^ 
when she was a child, told her in secret the 
story of Christ. 

Then another new world, more lovely and 
alluring and more unlimited than the earth 
had seemed, lay open before Naia. Again 
she started away alone, in her earliest free- 
dom of the spirit, in childish confidence and 
with joy unspeakable, doing unto others the 
first things she had ever done, with all 
the hopeless world before her, for Christ’s 
sake; all her kindling desire carrying her 


190 


ITALIAN COURTESY 


out and away from security in the old faith 
to martyrdom in the confession of the new. 
But it would be impossible to think of her 
fate as a dark tragedy. It has never seemed 
more distressing than as though a child had 
fallen painlessly to the earth; and at least 
one valley of Liguria has her still as its 
patroness, its patron saint, a present and a 
healing influence. There she is still Our 
Lady of the Valley, who may be seen in 
her white stone church half-way up the 
steep eastern slope. 

It is a valley that the soft beauty of the 
Mediterranean Sea would seem to have 
compelled from the rugged Maritime Alps; 
it sets inward and northward so bravely, 
carpeted with violets and vines; and its red 
wine has a fugitive perfume stolen from vio- 
lets. There is a stream down the centre, 
crossed by a Roman bridge. The converg- 
ing hills on either side are very high, and 
are terraced half-way up, showing even 
lines of masonry and gray-green olive trees ; 
then above the olives are bleak walls of 
rock, cliffs, and such impassable things. 
You may walk away from the violets up to 
the snow line and bitter winds, if you have 
good legs, in half an hour. The north 
191 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


wind leaps from that barrier, and falls upon 
the sea a whole league from shore ; you may 
see the white caps out there. One is the 
more secure, by contrast, in the valley. And 
one is most secure, they say, by reason of 
Our Lady of the Valley, who looks mildly 
down from her white stone church, built 
near the upper boundary of the belt of 
olives on the eastern side. 

A miracle-working picture makes Our 
Lady of the Valley visible to those who 
come in sorrow, with prayers for sick 
friends. One day Vincent came from San 
Remo, coming on foot, as a pilgrim should ; 
and, having hours of leisure in the middle of 
the day, he was tempted to follow the 
stream upward to the point at which it 
entered the valley through a gorge, where 
the air itself was held still, and the light 
falling through it at mid-day was golden. 
The stream of water, white with froth and 
spray — and as though with fear when it 
came to the brink — fell over a dull brown 
cliff, and falling, falling, until it was noth- 
ing but froth and spray, came to its confi- 
dent self again at the bottom of the gorge, 
and moved away southward between steep 
dull brown walls of rock. And the gorge 
192 


SAN REMO 




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ITALIAN COURTESY 


was so narrow that the sunlight, pouring over 
its edges, and falling, falling, seemed to be 
pressed together and to become heavier in 
descent, even as the water of the stream 
became lighter. At the bottom the white 
stream received all the light, and in the 
silence of that lonely place there was really 
nothing but a stream of white water and a 
stream of golden light, that moved away 
between near dull cliffs toward the valley 
and the Mediterranean Sea. But presently 
came a shadow that slid and slipped along 
over the surface of the stream of water, and 
showed for an instant, with sudden increase, 
on the side of the gorge, and again slipped 
back and slid, circling, crossing, hiding, 
reappearing, searching, seeking. For there 
was a great bird soaring on steady pinions 
between the sun and the gorge. At high 
noon the sun looked in upon the stream 
between the cliffs, and saw, what it made, 
the shadow of an eagle which seemed to 
be nearer to the sun than to the earth — but 
only while the morning hesitated to become 
afternoon. Then the shadow hid itself in a 
tuft of gray brush that grew at the foot of 
the cliff ; the great bird had darted south- 
ward. 


193 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


Under the gray brush and dry leaves, 
where the shadow disappeared, there was a 
small bed of a pink-tipped flower. So the 
shadow, in delicate representation of Naia’s 
death, had been looking for the flower. 

Such significance in things that are com- 
monly unremarked, Vincent found in the 
whole valley. The day was perfect, and a 
perfect day in the Riviera makes strange 
things possible. And when he stood before 
the miracle-working picture of Our Lady of 
the Valley, it scarcely seemed an imperti- 
nence that the old fellow who opened the 
church for him and drew aside the curtain 
that hid the picture asked : 

‘‘Are you married?” (The idiom let him 
ask it more politely.) 

“Yes,” said Vincent. He looked at the 
painting with disappointment, for its work- 
manship was hardly above mediocrity, 
although it represented a very sweet and 
noble face that had been young when the 
Christian era was young, and had never 
grown old. 

“And you have children, sir?” 

Vincent said that he had a daughter at 
the Villa Mora in San Remo, and with a 
friendly impulse he mentioned her name. 

194 


ITALIAN COURTESY 

‘‘Eh? . . . Ah!’' said the old fellow. He 
went nearer to the painting, and crossed 
himself; and then he spoke the courteous 
word: “Your wife and child, sir — if they 
are ever sick, you will bring them here to 
be cured? — to please Our Lady — for Her 
sake.’’ 


195 


XX 


A Bare Head in Liguria 


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These notes of the bugle sound the even- 
ing summons (the ritirata they call it in 
Italy) from the barracks. 

Some high white walls still gleam in sun- 
shine, but there is deep shade in the nar- 
row, crooked streets of San Remo. 

For the very reason that the day’s work 
is over, it is a stirring hour. Villagers are 
going away, going up the steep paths that 
lead from town to their homes among the 
foothills of the Maritime Alps, driving their 
mules before them with sarcastic words of 
love. In Vittorio Emanuele Street shop- 
keepers are ‘^putting the head out for a 
breath,” as they say, which means that they 
stand in the doorways to gossip with neigh- 
bors expansively, after the narrowing effects 
196 


A BARE HEAD IN LIGURIA 


of a day spent in trade. The poorest peo- 
ple — so poor that they economize even their 
indulgence in church-going — are on their 
way to or from “a little prayer.” Officers 
of the Bersaglieri strut along by twos and 
threes, with some unavoidable noise of 
swords and spurs, as they come from the 
promenade. Their fatigue caps are tilted 
forward and almost rest upon their noses, 
yet they succeed in eyeing the women. 
Past the chattering dealer in mosaics, past 
the embroidery shop and the jeweler’s, these 
handsome fellows go until they reach a caffi, 
where they seat themselves at small tables 
that stand on the sidewalk. Common sol- 
diers of the same regiment, with cock-feather 
plumes waving from wide-brimmed hats, and 
shaken rhythmically in time to vigorous 
short steps, hurry along toward the bar- 
racks at the sound of the ritirata. 

From the lower window of a house in the 
old quarter a girl is leaning. Below, in the 
street, stands a soldier. He is begging for 
the flower she holds between her white 
teeth. In the opposite doorway are two 
women watching the courtship. One of 
these women holds in her arms a baby who 
is crying lustily, while the mother lets it 
197 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


make playthings of her long ear-rings, hop- 
ing thus to quiet it in order that she may 
hear what her pretty neighbor is saying to 
the Bersagliere, 

‘‘Why do you want my rose?” asks the 
girl at the window. 

“To keep as a souvenir of your lovely 
face,” is the answer. “Give it to me, gioja 
hella. ' ’ 

“Do not listen to him, Marianna,” the 
motherly neighbor interrupts. “They are 
all alike — those soldiers!” She sways from 
side to side to quiet her child. “I remem- 
ber when I was young. Ah, those cock’s 
feathers have brushed many a cheek, be- 
lieve me. Keep to your town sweethearts, 
I say. They are steady, while these sharp- 
shooters are always on the march.” 

At the same moment the ritirata sounds 
again. *^Ecco!'' the woman exclaims con- 
clusively. “Did I not tell you so?” she 
urges, as the soldier turns his face barrack- 
ward and begins to run, calling back over 
his shoulder: ^^Addio! addio! I shall 
come to-morrow to beg it from your lips, 
sweet Marianna. Do not listen to that 
woman!” 

While the three neighbors join in easy 
198 


A BARE HEAD IN LIGURIA 


laughter the soldier disappears; and then 
that frankness in regard to love affairs that 
characterizes Italians of all classes has free 
play. 

Marta, you are a very witch!” her com- 
panion exclaims. “You must have been in 
league with the devil to have made the 
ritirata sound at your words.” Here they 
all laugh again, and there appears at Marta’s 
door a stout man with a pipe in his mouth 
and yellow slippers on his feet. 

“The joke, the joke,” he cries. “Let 
me laugh also,” — taking the child from his 
wife’s arms. 

Marianna explains : “Friend Pietro, your 
Marta is a dangerous woman for young girls 
to have near; she sends their sweethearts 
about-face too quickly,” — smiling as she 
twirls the flower in her brown hands. 

“No, no, little one, ’ ’ the good woman pro- 
tests, advancing to the window, her strong 
soft arms akimbo. “I speak to you in ear- 
nest. Your Giulio, down in the town, earn- 
ing his money daily, is worth a whole dozen 
soldati. This other fine fellow, with his 
white gaiters, his plumes, and his Neapolitan 
tongue, is just a rogue like all his comrades. 
He has a sweetheart at Bordighera, Ospeda- 


199 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


letti, Colla, and every town within running 
distance. They always have. ’Twould be 
a pity to match your good dowry and 
household linen against a handsome face 
and a penny a day — eh? . . . Ah!” 

^•You speak truly,” the young girl 
admits, still twirling the flower and looking 
down at it to keep her friends (quick read- 
ers of every expression) from seeing her 
eyes. How that rose, for which only a 
moment before he had been pleading, now 
pleads for him — recalling his presence, his 
flattering words. And, even more persuasive 
than his smooth Southern tongue, his ardent 
Southern glance — how hard its pleading — 
with only a penny a day ! A sigh almost 
escapes her lips, but is retained in the full 
bodice^ for now Pietro is speaking like an 
echo of common-sense. 

‘‘Yes, yes,” he says, “a penny a day is 
the soldier’s pay. A fine house with his 
wife’s money, while he marches away to 
make love in the next town. You are right, 
Marta, you are right.” 

“And it is always money for tobacco,” 
chimes in Marta’s companion, who is too 
fat for many words, but is considered an 
amiable conversationalist, inasmuch as she 


200 


A BARE HEAD IN LIGURIA 


nods her head approvingly at all her neigh- 
bors’ sayings. ‘‘Soon the soup goes, and 
only the herbs remain on the cold stove.” 

When her friends return slowly to their 
respective doorsteps, Marianna is herself 
again. The idea of nothing but herbs, 
sweethearts in other towns, and money for 
tobacco which is not tobacco, appeals to 
the chief Ligurian virtues ; and she arranges 
her thick glossy hair in soft curls before the 
little mirror in her bedroom, making ready 
to go with her friend Lucia to meet Giulio, 
the wood-carver, on his way home from the 
town below. 

The market-place in San Remo is a large, 
irregular, roughly-paved square, with a 
fountain and several trees in the centre. Its 
narrow outlets are the dark over-arched 
alleys of the old jammed-together quarter 
where the right of way is freely and frankly 
accorded to the donkey. As for that stub- 
born loiterer, the stolid expression of his 
grave face says unmistakably that this part 
of town he considers his domain, and by his 
half-closed eyes he shows that he does not 
mean to treat you here as he is obliged to 
treat you on the fine new promenade, where 
his life is made a burden by shouts, kicks. 


201 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


and cracking and lashing of whips, forcing 
him to the right or to the left. “Now and 
here,“ he seems to say to the human animal, 
^^you will turn aside, if you please.” 

The buildings that line the market-place 
are held at a high price, for their indwellers 
realize that their value increases from trad- 
ing generation unto trading generation, and 
assert that nothing less than an earthquake 
can dislodge them. Then, too, the church 
which almost fills the upper side of the 
place — the principal church in which 
the most interesting civic events connected 
with birth, marriage, and death are cele- 
brated — is a consideration not less real than 
the advantage of being always under shelter 
of one’s own house on market days. 

Between six and eleven o’clock in the 
morning, the market-place is alive with 
undressed good-nature. In the matter of 
little clothing the Ligurian women are 
always suspects: the mule-drivers’ sashes 
have a more coming-off effect here than 
when seen elsewhere; ragged children 
abound ; officers and soldiers, home from an 
early march, are covered with dust and 
otherwise not coated ; military body-servants 
in shirt sleeves are drawing water at the 


202 


A BARE HEAD IN LIGURIA 


hydrants for their masters’ toilet ; each one 
excusing his appearance to all the rest, and 
all the rest politely (and self-consciously) 
accepting the excuses offered. 

As the large church clock strikes eleven, 
Marianna, in her short skirts, which show 
her neat shoes and a bit of white stocking, 
appears in the market-place. The smooth 
coils of her well-dressed hair shine in the sun, 
a soft shawl is folded over her bosom, and 
all about her is that mellowness which the 
Italian climate lends to its women for a few 
years of maturity before it begins to dry 
them like plump grapes which are to be 
raisins. On her arm she carries a small 
basket, the position of which she changes 
frequently in order to hold her elbows close 
to her side and thereby keep the shawl in 
place. Although her head is bent, her eyes 
scan the groups of townspeople inquiringly. 

EccOy Marianna,” a little old woman 
calls out from under a big red umbrella. 
‘^Are you looking {ox mammarn? It is but 
one-half minute since she left her market- 
basket at the church door and passed in 
with her mistress.” 

Marianna’s mother (the mammam referred 
to) is cook at the Villa Mora; and as her 
203 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


wages are thus adapted to the princely for- 
eign standard in such matters, being eighty 
lire per month, with many perquisites, she 
has been able to put aside for her daughter 
a dowry which all envy, admire, or covet, 
according to temperament and sex. Out 
of her earnings this good Tommasina has also 
bought what she terms a baracca, which is 
a tiny house on a grape-growing strip of 
land, far up on the mountain side. This 
bit of land is cultivated by Tommasina’s 
one-eyed husband, and, in addition to the 
wine, it produces many vegetables. In 
winter the man lodges in two rooms with 
his daughter in the town, where Marianna 
cooks and sews for him, and makes lace 
when she has time. 

‘‘My husband,” Tommasina has been 
heard to say, “because of his blindness in 
one eye, is only fit to help me at the villa 
during the winter, blacking shoes, pumping 
water, running errands, and attending 
strictly to church days, as I am unable to 
do so myself.” Her church time she is 
obliged to use, she says, “for the benefit of 
her family, ” — which means going the rounds 
of shops where Vincent pays his bills at 
irregular intervals for provisions sent to the 

204 


A BARE HEAD IN LIGURIA 


villa, and where she as irregularly receives 
her percentage and reward for uncritical 
patronage ; or perhaps, for the benefit of her 
family, she has only to sell back wine bot- 
tles to the merchants who supply the villa. 
At any rate, her church time is all used up, 
and her husband is required to ‘‘attend 
strictly.'’ But now at last she has actually 
come to church as well as to market in the 
course of duty, in attendance upon her 
mistress. 

Marianna thanks the little market woman 
for her information, and presently stands 
before the stuccoed edifice in which Liguri- 
ans confess and pray after selling and buy- 
ing. At the entrance she searches for her 
mother’s well-known head-basket among 
the many overflowing panniers that line the 
vestibule walls. Only one donkey is hitched 
in the vestibule, where iron rings fastened 
to the stonework offer accommodation for a 
number; he stands waiting for some wor- 
shiping master, and exposed to sore temp- 
tation amid these heaps of green vegetables 
and fruit, with lettuce leaves on top. Mari- 
anna makes her way into the church, and 
then it needs but a minute to touch fore- 
head and breast with holy water, to accus- 
205 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


tom her eyes to the dim light, and to 
discover her mother in the half-filled build- 
ing. 

Tommasina is doing the honors of the 
church to her mistress by bringing a camp- 
chair and placing it quite near the altar for 
the lady, after which she herself falls on 
her knees on the bare stones. Evidently 
she feels at home here, with all the Italian 
peasant’s homely proprietary sense — as 
though it were just her house, her finer 
house, of which her little baracca up among 
the vines and olives might be called the 
humble annex. 

Now the priest is making the memento 
for the dead, standing in silence with hands 
joined before his breast. Only a slender 
golden bar is shot across this mystic light 
from all the glare of sunshine in the market- 
place. On the uplifted faces of the wor- 
shipers one reads forgetfulness of the 
body. But no sooner has the holy bread 
been taken than there is a stir, a careless 
moving about, a shuffling of chairs and feet, 
and the most of those present commence 
making their way slowly toward the door. 
Marianna puts her hand on her mother’s 
arm. 


206 


A BARE HEAD IN LIGURIA 


‘^Ah, little one, what are you doing 
here?” 

have to buy fish for dinner,” Mari- 
anna replies, dropping a courtesy to Gloria 
and with the others they come out into 
the bright sunlight. Souls seem to have 
been left behind in the incense of the church, 
but to the genial warmth outside hearts re- 
spond — especially Marianna’s, as she catches 
sight of a dark face smiling beneath cock’s 
feathers. Tommasina does not see the nod 
of recognition; but after her basket has 
been found and firmly planted on her head 
she looks around for her daughter, who at 
that instant happens to make a little warn- 
ing sign for the benefit of the Bersagliere, 
to let him know that the time is not propi- 
tious. Tommasina excuses herself to her 
mistress and catches Marianna by the shoul- 
der. 

‘‘Who is your new friend, child?” she 
asks hurriedly. ‘‘A friend of your Giulio? 
Tell me!” 

Hot blood rushes to the girl’s face. ‘‘No, 
mother, only a soldier from the barracks 
who” — hesitating — “who teases me.” 

“Teases you! How? For what?” 

‘ ‘ Oh, nothing. J ust for a rose, yesterday. 

207 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


Teased you for roses yesterday, and is 
looking out for you to-day! Listen, Mari- 
anna,” — in genuine alarm. ‘‘You are a 
sensible girl. Remember all the years your 
mother, who loves you, has worked and 
saved for your dowry. Not a lira of it will 
ever go into uniform pockets ! Could you 
live on a penny a day?” With these words 
she moves away to join her mistress, her 
head-basket shading an anxious face. 

Always the same “penny a day,” Mari- 
anna thinks, as she walks quickly to the fish 
stall. The little fish-woman is trying to 
wait on all her six or seven customers at 
once, dealing out to this one, receiving 
money from another, in a whirl of trade and 
good nature. “I shall wait on you in two 
minutes by the church clock, my little Mari- 
anna, ” she calls out, as the girl picks up 
some fresh sardines by their tails, from the 
bucket in which they swim. 

“Do you really know how to stuff those 
fine fellows for dinner, pretty Marianna?” a 
melodious voice asks over her shoulder. 
The Bersagliere has come up behind her 
and looks hungrily at the sardines. ‘ ‘ What 
can you not do?” he continues. “What is 
there about you that is not attractive? Eh ! 

208 


A BARE HEAD IN LIGURIA 

Tell me yourself, for I shall never discover 
it.” 

”Go and say the same thing to your 
sweethearts in Ospedaletti, Colla, and all 
the other towns within running distance,” 
answers the girl, quoting from the advice 
she had received the evening before, but 
blushing furiously. 

”Ah, gipsy that you are! to make me 
vow again and again that I was born blind, 
and only received sight on looking upon 
you ! But tell me, who has put into your 
heart of gold so much lead? The one who 
just now took you by the shoulder? Say, 
is that your mother? Only show her to me 
again, that I may ask her to be my main- 
marn also.” 

“Here, my fine bird!” interrupts the 
fishwife, bustling up to them and flirting 
his cock-feather plume with her little scaly 
hand, “don’t waste time making pretty 
speeches to our Marianna. Her lover, the 
wood-carver, in the shop not many streets 
from here, will make an olivewood coffin 
for you, for all you are a soldier.” 

Nothing could please the Neapolitan bet- 
ter than the opportunity thus furnished him 
to indulge in a little blustering talk, with 
209 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


jocular reference to musket-balls and knives> 
making the desired impression upon the 
women; and truly he seems to them not 
less poetical than fierce when he compares 
Marianna’s favor to the sunlight and the 
wood-carver to a thief, ‘Vho would keep 
the rays of the sun from shining on others.” 
Then with an air of easy triumph he tells 
the girl that he will come for her rose at 
sunset. 

“No, no!” says Marianna, quickly, 
thinking of her neighbors’ disapproval. 
“Not there.” 

“Then will you walk in the public garden 
this evening?” He guesses the nature of 
her objection, and mentions the giardino 
publico because, when the band plays there, 
every one meets everybody, and lovers may 
come together as though by accident. 
“Say yes quickly; I must go,” he urges, 
an officer appearing in the market-place. 

“Yes, I am going to the music, but — ” 
How can she tell him that it must be with 
Giulio? She hesitates, but he forces the 
favorable conclusion, and crying, “Then 
until to-night, addio!"' he is gone. 

“How handsome he is, eh?” Rosetta, 
the fish-woman, says, coming back with a 


210 


A BARE HEAD IN LIGURIA 


brown paper full of sardines, which she 
thrusts into Marianna’s basket. “I always 
wish I were young again when I see the 
soldiers. What a pity that they are so 
expensive to marry.” 

You may be sure there is a warm place for 
this fat little fishwife in Marianna’s heart 
as she turns into the town. It is not yet 
time to cook dinner, so she can go into the 
shop where Lucia works for the fine milliner 
in the Via Vittorio Emanuele, and buy a 
piece of red ribbon to wear to-night. And, 
of course, she thinks of Giulio, too, for it 
has been her habit to think of him when- 
ever she turned her face toward Vittorio 
Emanuele Street; and truly, she reasons 
with herself, ought she not to be proud of 
him, even if he does stoop a little from his 
confining work? Do not all the serious- 
minded girls in town envy her? But yet, 
but yet — it would be a fine thing to have 
a soldier for her husband instead of going 
bareheaded all her life. With pride she 
imagines herself walking arm-in-arm with 
her Neapolitan through the streets of large 
towns where the Bersaglieri would be sta- 
tioned. Once away from her native place, 
she would wear a bonnet and jacket for the 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


first time. She would then forget the days 
of bare head and shawl, and she would 
rise superior to the bareheaded peasants 
among whom she had lived. Her Neapoli- 
tan would think her lovely in a bonnet, 
accustomed as he was to women in large 
cities. Giulio, on the contrary, would be 
shocked at even the suggestion of such use- 
less finery, such unsuitable ornaments, and 
would laugh her to scorn for trying to look 
like a donna.” ^‘Such extravagance, 
too,” he would be sure to say. 

By this time she has come before the win- 
dows of a neat shop where every kind of 
ornament made from olivewood is dis- 
played. In the doorway sits a young man 
bent over his work, which is a picture-frame 
inlaid with swallows and bars of music. His 
face wears an anxious look as he glances up 
at the sound of her step. 

” Marianna. ” 

”How pale you are. What is it?” she 
asks quickly. 

”My mother,” he begins in a broken 
voice as he rises and leads her into the shop. 
She sits on the wooden bench offered her, 
while he stands before her, his back to the 
light, trying to conceal the tears that are 


212 


A BARE HEAD IN LIGURIA 


filling his eyes. This effort is made, how- 
ever, solely with the purpose of saving her 
feelings and not because he is ashamed to 
show emotion. 

“I have been there, at home, four times 
since breakfast,” he continues. ^‘It is her 
old pain about the heart.” 

‘Hs the pain so bad to-day?” 

He does not answer directly, but looks 
into her eyes with an appeal for sympathy. 
“You know how good a mother she has 
always been to me, and her pain is surely 
my own. I must be with her whenever I 
can — she is so old now. Ah, little Mari- 
anna, how can I ask you to forego the pleas- 
ure of the music to-night? — for I cannot 
go—” 

“Giulio mio, the girl replies, tenderly, 
springing up to put her hand before his 
mouth, “do not think of me for an instant. 
I will go to see your mother, and, if she 
wishes, stay with her this afternoon. I 
don’t care a bit about the music now, and 
if I did Lucia might go with me.” 

“Really? Are you not disappointed? You 
sweet little girl. Take that’ ’ — kissing her — 
“to my mother from me.” 

The wood-carver’s gentleness and his dis- 


213 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


tress work a momentary change of heart in 
the young girl ; still it is with heightened 
color and shining eyes that she goes on her 
way to find Lucia, for the sympathetic pang 
she had felt for Giulio is forgotten in the 
happiness of this unexpected freedom. This 
one evening will be hers to enjoy in her own 
way. She means to give herself up to a 
dream for once — for just this once. 

She finds Lucia at the back of a small 
millinery shop, with a delicate creation of 
tulle and flowers in her hands, to which she 
is just giving the finishing touches. 

‘‘Are you alone?” she asks mysteriously, 
and glancing quickly about. 

“Yes. Where do you come from, with 
such a pair of cheeks?” 

“Giulio will not go to the public garden 
to-night. Can I go with you?” 

This is said so eagerly that they both 
laugh. Lucia understands at once, and 
merely asks: “At what hour shall I call for 
you ?” 

“Eight, without fail. And, Lucia, I want 
a bit of red ribbon for my throat.” 

Lucia rises and takes down a box from 
the shelf. The hat she has been making is 
no sooner on the counter than Marianna 


214 


A BARE HEAD IN LIGURIA 


takes it up, and, standing before the mirror, 
glancing admiringly at her reflection, turn- 
ing from side to side, tempts herself. Lucia 
sees her and cries: ‘‘Lovely! Precious! Like 
a bride! Ah, what a pity that you must 
marry Giulio and can never wear a hat.” 

Marianna tears it from her head in a rage. 
“Why do you always remind me of this?” 
she demands bitterly. “Each time I come 
here and try on a hat you make the same 
remark. The only time in my life when 
I shall ever wear a hat is in this shop. I 
knew it as well as you. . . . Why not let 
me enjoy the thing for one minute?” 

“Forgive me,” Lucia says, and her pro- 
• fessional eye rests in sorrow upon the poor 
head that is condemned to make an 
unadorned journey through life. “See,” 
she goes on in a cooing voice, “this shade 
will make you lovely” — holding a piece of 
ribbon under her friend’s chin. Marianna is 
propitiated, for the color is really most 
becoming. 

And thus a fifty-franc hat (that Lucia 
trimmed) was the pretty devil, bringing 
together a bareheaded Ligurian girl and a 
Neapolitan soldier, and, when they were 
215 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


fast together, leaving them condemned to 
each other. 

To be sure there was an encounter be- 
tween Giulio and the Neapolitan, in which 
encounter the pale wood-carver was the 
aggressor and the sun-burned soldier cut so 
poor a figure that he was discharged from 
his regiment for cowardice. To put it 
plainly, he took a good beating. But 
although his pockets were no longer mili- 
tary, they never held a lira of Tommasina’s 
savings. Then there was a short-lived 
attempt at gayety in Naples, where for a 
time Marianna wore gilt bells on her 
garters. But the middle of their story seems 
just unrelieved dull distress, in spite of the 
gilt bells tinkling, until the distress was 
unbearable ; and then there came a padrone, 
going about as the agent of a steamship 
company among such people as Marianna 
and her husband, persuading and enabling 
them to emigrate to America. And finally 
the two immigrants, with their happiness 
in the past, have in their cheerless present a 
hand-organ which still can produce the notes 
of the Ritirata,'' of the bugle-call, and of 
the song that begins with those notes, just 
as written at the head of this chapter. 

216 


A BARE HEAD IN LIGURIA 


They have turned up in your street, per- 
haps, in.the course of their wanderings; and, 
if so, you may have noticed that Marianna, 
with a tin cup for pennies in her hand, had 
a bright cotton handkerchief tied like a bon- 
net over her head and under her chin. 

Well, Villa Mora was occupied by Vincent 
and Gloria (coming from London) one 
happy winter, when the little boy was hav- 
ing his first year at a New England school, 
and in his stead a still smaller girl had be- 
come the centre of their family life — the 
one indispensable person. And that, of 
course, is the reason why Marianna^s story 
became known. 


217 


XXI 


Vincent and Mademoiselle Mora 

For a few weeks after their arrival in San 
Remo the Vincents were somewhat at the 
mercy of incompetent Italian coachmen — I 
mean the drivers of public carriages. Fi- 
nally, in order to be rid of them, Vincent 
bought a little victoria with red wheels, 
and, to make these wheels spin properly, a 
willing young iron-gray horse of the Lom- 
bard stock. This was really on Gloria’s 
account, for she did not care for walking, 
while he usually preferred walking to driv- 
ing; but one day he appropriated the car- 
riage to his own use. You see he wanted 
to visit Bussana, where the earthquake did 
so much damage in 1887, and from Bussana 
he thought of going on to Taggia, where 
good oranges and violets and excellent red 
wine are to be found. The distance was 
not great, but the day promised to be hot. 
Then there was the victoria standing ready 
at the gate. He got in. 

218 


MADEMOISELLE MORA 


‘‘To Bussana, Michele!” 

“A bad road, signore,” Michele pro- 
tested. He did not like going into the 
country, and all roads leading away from 
San Remo were bad roads to him. In the 
country there were no acquaintances of his 
to be saluted with a loud crack of the whip, 
no rival coachmen to envy this smart little 
carriage over which he presided. 

“Never mind the road,” said Vincent; 
“I’d trust you to reach a place even if 
there were no road at all.” 

Mollified by this tribute to his ability, 
Michele shook the reins and uttered the 
peculiar “Oop!” — like the cooing of a 
mammoth dove — that an Italian horse 
understands. It signifies: “Go, for the love 
of me, my dear; and if you don’t go. I’ll 
take your hide off.” 

So they started at a rattling pace, which 
was maintained along the level highway 
until, with a sharp turn to the left, they 
began to ascend a hill which proved to be 
steep and rough, as Michele had said. 

At the roughest point in this road, where 
the inhabitants of the ruined village were 
engaged in building new homes for them- 
selves, they came on an old woman who 
219 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


was plodding along up the hill; so Vincent 
made her get in beside him, and with this 
strange companion to answer questions 
about the earthquake, paid his first visit to 
Bussana. Of course he supposed she would 
be pleased to be carried to her destination 
in this comfortable fashion, and perhaps 
still more pleased to receive a piece of sil- 
ver for her services as guide; but she gave 
no lively evidence of satisfaction. On the 
contrary, she replied to inquiries as briefly 
as possible, and with averted face. In fact, 
she seemed so dull and ill at ease that he 
was glad to let her go as soon as they had 
driven into the town. 

But then suddenly, after she had disap- 
peared, she became interesting, for Michele 
leaned down from the box to say: “Does 
the signore know who that is? No? That 
is Mademoiselle Mora, who owns your villa. 
And she has other houses, too. The signore 
may not believe it, but she is not so old by 
any means as she looked. And quite hand- 
some she is, really. She just makes up that 
way, and goes out to beg, although she is 
rich, rich, rich!” 

“Nonsense, Michele!” Vincent said, as 
little pleased as people usually are on being 


220 


MADEMOISELLE MORA 


told that they have been blind to a transpar- 
ent fraud. 

Michele replied by pointing with his whip 
at one of the buildings that had been most 
severely dealt with by the earthquake. 
More than half of the entire structure had 
fallen to the ground. ‘‘That belongs to her 
also,” he added, indifferently, as though he 
did not care how much or how little impor- 
tance was attached to the statement. 


221 


XXII 

The Villa and the Town 

To an amiable house courtesy is easily 
proffered, as it is to an amiable person ; and 
we need not content ourselves with saying 
that it shares the family life which it makes 
possible. Such a villa is not merely recep- 
tive. It has its expression, and its own 
point of view. 

Villa Mora looked out upon the Mediter- 
ranean sea, from an olive grove above the 
town. 

It was not at all a grand house, although 
to be sure an old beggar at the gate saluted 
Vincent with the question, ‘^Are you the 
lordship of this palace?” {Signoria di quest' 
palazzof') The garden was small, being only 
a narrow strip between the house and the 
olives, with just about room in it for a few 
hedges of geranium, a lot of heliotrope, 
half a dozen small palms with as many 
orange trees, and an abundance of roses. 
A much larger but less comfortable house, 


222 


THE VILLA AND THE TOWN 

in which the German Prince Frederick had 
fought with death, was not far away. 
Between the two places was a narrow path 
leading by a flight of rough stone steps 
quite directly to the town ; and this path, 
this mule path, was continued above the 
house, passing along by the high garden 
wall up the hillside. There was a mountain 
beyond, and still the mule path kept on — 
up — up — I can’t say how far. Sturdy 
peasants clattered up and down pretty con- 
stantly, going to or from a village set back 
among the hills, or with baskets full of 
olives on their heads, or with a thin-legged 
ass or two carrying bales of goods and casks 
of wine. Many of the girls were beautiful, 
and altogether Vincent liked the look of the 
people. They were strong and brown, and 
polite enough, and appeared to take work 
and poverty with a good grace. Both 
men and women had a way of blending 
shades — or fades — of red and blue in their 
dress, so that if Vincent happened to lie 
awake at night and recall the figures he had 
seen during the day, it was like turning a 
kaleidoscope. Not that they had delicate 
taste in dress; rather the contrary. They 
bought the bright, crude colors, and then 
223 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


wore them until they had faded to soft 
tints. So the poorest old gowns were the 
prettiest, and the poorest old hag might 
wear the prettiest fades. Early and late 
and forever they would sing out-of-doors, 
throughout the day for their own amuse- 
ment and throughout the evening for pay.* 
The most candid beggar among them was 
one of these open-air musicians — a thin 
man with a long, red nose, who sang “Santa 
Lucia,” “Funiculi, Funicula, ” and such 
popular melodies under the Vincents’ win- 
dows, tooting between the verses on a pipe. 
When he had finished he sent in by the 
maid a written receipt, stamped and signed 
in due form, for the amount he expected to 
get. He wanted voice as well as money, 
that chap; but sometimes good, ringing 
tenors, signed and stamped by Nature, were 
uplifted in praise of everything Italian — 
from a pretty housemaid to the Vesuvian 
railway — all through the dinner hour. Then * 
the Vincents gave much applause, a little 
silver, and perhaps a glass of wine apiece; 
also, if they were inferior musicians but had 

*It is the climate and the scenic harmonies that make people 
sing in Italy. Italy composes a voice every hour, and then the 
voice lodges in a human throat. Sometimes a traveler will find 
his voice there. The Vincents found theirs — at least, they began 
to speak more freely, and Gloria began to sing. 

224 


VILLA INIORA 



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THE VILLA AND THE TOWN 


a revengeful look, Gloria thought she saved 
the household from assassination by throw- 
ing a few coppers from the windows. 

Just below the Prince’s villa was a high- 
way leading to Genoa; below the highway 
were several hotels with large gardens ; then 
beyond these hotels was the Mediterranean. 
The sound of breakers along the beach came 
to the villa very distinctly at all times, and 
with a great roar when the sea was rough. 
Only a few coasting-vessels with cargoes of 
wine visited this harbor, for it was small 
and shallow — its waters curiously streaked 
with yellow and brown and blue by the cur- 
rent of a stream that emptied into it. There 
the infrequent brigantines would be unladen 
behind the stone pier, bleeding fresh purple 
grape juice into tuns and casks, and then 
resting as though life had gone out of them. 
Women would come down to the shore 
carrying empty casks, form a little wran- 
gling group around the tun last opened, and 
then disperse through the streets with full 
casks balanced on their heads — with purple 
lips and hands and spattered skirts. Sensu- 
ous and placid, they would carry the burden 
to little cabins among the olives, or disappear 
among the dark ways of the old town. 

225 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


The houses of the old town were so 
closely packed together, and so entirely 
haphazard were the narrow lanes in its jum- 
bled mass, that one could not help fancying 
that it had extended a long way up the 
hillside originally, and that then the higher 
portion must have slipped down and jammed 
all together. It was a town knocked into 
a cocked-hat. Near the shore, however, 
were wide modern streets and bright shops, 
where Italian, French, German, and English 
were all spoken badly, and where represen- 
tatives of the first-named nation fleeced 
tourists of the other three famously. Big 
hotels and pensions abounded there. 

The old jammed part was very interest- 
ing — not so dirty as you might expect, full 
of color from the bright handkerchiefs and 
shawls and gowns and caps; also with star- 
tling effects of light and shade, where the 
sky at noon showed between dark, high, 
close-standing houses, like an open furnace 
door. Here and there the sky was shut out 
altogether, and the street became a tunnel 
with a dwelling above it ; elsewhere arches 
were stretched across, as though to prevent 
further crowding. A great deal was done 
in these narrow, twisting alleys which was 
226 


THE VILLA AND THE TOWN 


worth looking at, because one saw the whole 
family life so easily. If you could look 
right through the fronts of all the houses in 
an American town, you would take people 
off their guard to about the same extent. 

Such mere naturalness had jnany distaste- 
ful manifestations, of course, but also many 
quaint and delightful sides. 

For example, it was surely a form of the 
same simplicity that an old priest showed, 
one cool day. This old priest had gone 
with his housekeeper — a middle-aged, 
strong-featured woman of square figure — 
into a shop to buy several undershirts for 
himself. He wanted a good bargain, and 
he went about it in this way. The house- 
keeper was to beat the shopman down, while 
the reverend father looked on and decided 
when the right point had been reached. So 
these three stood together in the draper’s 
shop — draper and servant with heads close 
together, yet speaking thunderously and 
shrilly while the priest was attentive at a 
slight remove. 

‘‘But I can’t make it less!” cried the 
draper. 

“Does not the Bible say, ‘Clothe the 
naked?’ ” the housekeeper insisted; “and 
227 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


will you let your spiritual father go un- 
clothed, without a good warm — I mean, a 
flimsy, shoddy shirt like this? which is 
scarcely worth lugging home; but I will 
take them at one lira apiece.’' The price 
was three times that much. 

As the woman quoted Scripture, she 
referred to the priest, who nodded ap- 
proval. 

“You see,” she continued, “it is in the 
Bible. One lira each. Will you sin against 
the holy book? Think of this, you rich 
man — you, who could afford to give them 
for nothing. Honor thy father, and if a 
respectable priest is cold, clothe him, that 
thy days may be long. Is that not also in 
the Bible?” Again she appealed to her 
master, who nodded vigorously, but said 
never a word. 

This was too much for the draper. It 
might be commanded in the Bible that one 
must sell underwear below cost. He did 
not know. The priest must know, and 
even his servant would naturally be better 
posted as to the contents of the Bible than 
a mere man of business. 

“Let them go for one lira, then,” he 
said; “but don’t tell anybody.” 

228 


THE VILLA AND THE TOWN 


There was no moral in the scene, but much 
Italian nature ; and as at its conclusion Vin- 
cent turned away, he saw that Ravelli was 
also looking on with interest. 

‘^We Ligurians are all like that,’’ said 
Ravelli. 


229 


XXIII 

The High Note 

''Ravelli Cav. Alberto, Maestro di 
Musica, ” was the inscription on his card. 
He gave Mrs. Vincent lessons in singing; 
that is how the acquaintance began. 

Maestro Ravelli was an excellent musi- 
cian, a composer of no great distinction, but 
fair repute ; and for years he had conducted 
the San Remo orchestra, being employed 
by the town for that purpose at a salary of 
two thousand five hundred lire. He had 
had a number of grand friends and patrons, 
his compositions had gained first medals at 
Paris and Milan ; so he looked up to him- 
self with esteem. The work with the town 
band he regarded as unworthy of his talents 
— but twenty-five hundred lire! That was 
three-fourths of his income. 

You see how trouble would be sure to 
arise. He wanted to retain the position, 
but the musicians and the mayor must 
know his worth. Then, too, like every 


230 


THE HIGH NOTE 


interesting person, he had a temper. The 
musicians did not come up to the mark, 
once upon a time. Pouff! an explosion of 
his temper; a quarrel with the members 
of the band ; the mayor called in to decide. 
Now, the mayor was a self-made man; 
could such a person presume to know the 
merits of a question of music where the 
maestro was a party? 

Yes, the mayor did so presume, and 
rebuked Ravelli before his band. 

^‘Dolt! Ass! Upstart!” such epithets as 
these Ravelli applied to the mayor in return 
for this public rebuke. And so they had it 
out, until the maestro swore he would not 
lead the orchestra again before the mayor 
had offered him an apology. But then San 
Remo might have to do without music in 
the public garden of an afternoon; that 
was unthinkable. There must be music at 
least three times a week, or the mayor 
would make himself unpopular — and elec- 
tion day was drawing near. But Ravelli 
was the only good leader on the ground. 

The maestro insisted he would rather 
starve than sacrifice a bit of self-love. Now, 
this was certainly an artificial view of things, 
and yet as truly characteristic of people 
231 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


here as was the behavior of certain olive- 
gatherers who refreshed themselves with a 
bath in the roadway near the Vincent’s villa, 
men and women together stripping off their 
clothing and throwing water over each 
other. 

Suppose one were expressing an opinion 
upon manners in the Riviera. One might 
say the people show extreme sensitiveness 
and scrupulousness, insisting upon fine 
points of honor. That would be true. Or 
one might say: They have no manners; 
they are not even decent. That also would 
be true. Is it a question of class, then? 
Not a bit. The peasants are keen in a mat- 
ter of honor; the gentry are lax where the 
peasants are coarse. 

But if you would quickly and surely under- 
stand Ravelli’s character, consider for a 
moment the music and the dress of these 
Ligurians. In the Ligurian popular songs 
there is sure to occur at the end of each 
stanza a high, long, strong note. That is 
the important thing — that final note. The 
rest of the song is but preparation for it. 
And so of their operatic music. Have we 
not all seen the tenors running across the 
stage on tiptoe in pursuit of high C, with 
232 


THE HIGH NOTE 


mouth wide open to catch the note which 
is just beyond their reach ? It is the manner 
of Ligurian music — this single demonstra- 
tion of power. 

It is also the manner of Ligurian dress. 
Let the hair be smartly brushed and the 
hat set jauntily on one side; then never 
mind the rest. The cheap dandy is thus 
put in gorgeous array. He gives himself 
the airs of conscious beauty, although he 
may be in such shirt sleeves. Coatless 
but elegant, he ogles the women on Victor 
Emanuel Street, and conquers as he looks. 

The analogue is striking. Signor Cheap- 
fop’s high note is his hair. When he makes 
his toilette such details as boots and linen 
are hurried on, or some of them omitted. 
Then he elaborates his high note, and sin- 
cerely expects applause. 

The manner of Ligurian music and dress 
is also the manner of Ligurian manners and 
character. These people do not show uni- 
form considerateness, but occasional bursts 
of politeness, and such a sensitive nature 
that one wonders they can ever be brutish. 
You must expect from them, not high- 
toned manners, but high notes now and 
then — admirable, wonderful notes. And 


233 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


even these people I have mentioned — the 
peasants, the priest, the mayor — are all 
capable of a single demonstration of power. 
When they appear careless, commonplace, 
or silly, they are but holding in until the 
end of a stanza. 

The strife between the mayor and Maestro 
Ravelli resulted in a victory for the latter, 
whom Gloria invited to dine at Villa Mora 
to celebrate this happy event ; for she took 
much interest in the fortunes of her teacher, 
and contributed not a little to his success 
in his contest by employing him herself, 
speaking in his praise whenever she found 
opportunity, taking him with her whenever 
she wanted to buy music, or choose a 
piano — in a word, making herself his cham- 
pion with equal enthusiasm and tact. Such 
enthusiasm on her part kept up the little 
man’s reputation among the townspeople, 
and kept up his courage, too ; otherwise he 
would probably have yielded to the entreat- 
ies of his plain, oldish, but dearly beloved 
wife, who begged him to make any conces- 
sion and accept any terms which would keep 
them from starving. 

Vincent suggested inviting the wife also, 
but was thereupon assured on the highest 

234 


THE HIGH NOTE 


authority that Ravelli did not expect it. 
‘‘As artists they might be entertained, not 
as mere men with wives,” so the highest 
authority proceeded. “There was no such 
thing as an artist’s better half. That 
phrase, so truly descriptive of the relative 
social importance of ordinary husbands and 
wives, was not to be used in connection 
with Ravelli.” 

Accordingly he came alone, a full hour 
before the other guests. Vincent heard 
some one playing the piano, and went curi- 
ously into the sitting-room. There was 
Ravelli already. “I should like to com- 
pliment you on the concert of this after- 
noon — the first you have conducted for ever 
so long,” said Vincent, but Ravelli was 
rather conscious of a new black coat he 
wore, so did not understand that the com- 
pliment had reference to his orchestra, and 
thanked the other modestly for approval of 
his personal appearance. Vincent had still 
to dress, so begged him to make himself 
entirely at home, using for that purpose the 
Italian phrase, “5’ accommodi^'' and quot- 
ing Dumas p^re to the effect that this 
signified, “Enter: you are welcome; you 
are the master in this house, etc.” 


235 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


“No,” said the little man, “it only 
means ‘sit down.’ ” 

At dinner he spoke with great animation 
on a variety of subjects, eating and drink- 
ing largely, asking the servant the name of 
each wine as it was passed, and especially 
commending one sweet dish, in regard to 
the merits of which he was disposed to 
enter into conversation with a good-looking 
maid, who served him repeatedly. All this 
with such simplicity that every one voted 
him a good companion on the spot. 

When the ladies rose he grieved — most 
indubitably grieved, as though a sudden and 
unforeseen calamity had marred the joyous 
occasion. That was for an instant; the 
next instant, the doors having closed, he said 
with a sigh of deep content: “Now we are 
free! Now we can smoke!” 

A moment later his mouth, beneath a 
heavy black mustache, was twisted out of 
shape in the effort to hold the cigar so that 
its smoke would not curl up into his eyes; 
and this distortion acted upon the other 
men present as a whimsical invitation to 
notice his strong throat — fully displayed — 
and prominent aquiline nose; for the rest, a 
sallow, worn face and long hair, bunched 
236 


THE HIGH NOTE 


and over-abundant about the ears, but very- 
thin above. 

Fragments of conversation : — 

The guests had been discussing a sugges- 
tion that Spaniards were Irish-Latins, when 
Ravelli interposed: ‘^That seems to be a 
fruitful thought. The Italians, north of 
Naples, are more like English or German 
Latins.” 

Vincent referred to a letter just received 
from America, in which his correspondent, 
Mr. Taswell Langdon, had said: ‘^Of course 
every good American believes in our par- 
ticular variety of civilization, but I don’t 
see how we are to acquire amenities and 
escape provincialism, unless a war, or some 
such elemental upheaval, comes to take us 
out of ourselves and' our self-sufficiency.” 

Ravelli’s comment was, Am erica and 
England are kings, and can do no wrong.” 


237 


XXIV 


The False Windows 

Roses and violets were in full bloom at 
Christmas time; the season of figs was just 
passing, and the Vincents were just begin- 
ning to pick oranges. And remembering 
how attractive good native wine and hand- 
some, brown-skinned native women used to 
seem to him and the other college boys 
when they agreed that the Riviera would be 
a good place to live in, Vincent found wine 
so plentiful that beer was accounted a 
luxury, while the women were as handsome 
as they were brown, and brown as they were 
handsome, and brown and handsome as he 
used to fancy, but with eyes of a new color. 

So this feature and that of the actual San 
Remo — or rather his particular little villa 
near San Remo — tallied with that feature, 
and this of the picture his fancy had drawn. 
The situation was not quite ideal, of course, 
but nearly so. The larger elements were all 
238 


THE FALSE WINDOWS 

present, and if ever he began to be dissatis- 
fied because some detail of the wish had not 
been perfectly carried out — if he ever began 
to feel discontented — he had only to look 
through certain false windows in order to 
see the wish realized, to see the thing which 
did not exist. This I must explain. 

You must know, then, that his house 
stood quite alone on the side of a rather 
steep hill. Back of it was the steep hill- 
side, back of the hill a mountain, back of 
the mountain the North Pole. There was 
doubtless something between the mountain 
and the ultimate north, but one could not 
see it. On the north side the house had 
no windows whatever. In front and below 
was the town, beyond that the sea, beyond 
that the south. Between the sea and the 
ultimate south there were doubtless a great 
many places, but the Vincents had no visual 
intimation of them, nor had other people, 
except those who once in a while caught a 
glimpse of Corsica, like a cloud on the hori- 
zon, or saw a cloud on the horizon, which 
they mistook for Corsica. On this southern 
side were nearly all the windows — real 
windows. Of course this was a fine arrange- 
ment. Every room had the southern 
239 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


exposure, and the sunlight all day long; 
every room was warm and bright. 

So, then, at the back there were no win- 
dows; the largest of the real windows were 
in front ; at the sides, east and west, were 
the false windows. 

They were a very good imitation. Exam- 
ining the villa from the outside you would 
be sure to say it had nineteen lights. No; 
only fifteen. Four were false. 

The builder, one day, when he was called 
in to direct certain repairs, explained to 
Vincent his purpose in making these false 
windows. ^‘It is better for the sake of 
warmth,” he said, “to leave the walls at 
the sides blank; but that looked too plain, 
so I put these imitations where windows 
would naturally be found. That makes all 
symmetrical.” 

Now, Vincent, for his part, would have 
preferred actual lights or an uncompromis- 
ing blank wall, one thing or the other with- 
out deceit. But since these false windows 
were there, he thought he might as well use 
them. 

He did use them now and then. For 
example, his garden was rather small, while 
on both hands the olive grove surrounding 
240 


THE FALSE WINDOWS 


it, terraced, with many fine old trees, capable 
of becoming an earthly paradise, was for 
sale. As he looked through the false win- 
dows on the east he saw a multitude of 
date-palms, fig trees, and orange trees, cov- 
ering the land on that side; while by look- 
ing through the false windows on the west 
he saw a fine cascade — a thing he was very 
fond of, and the very thing needed to com- 
plete the picture — tumbling down the ter- 
raced hillside, between the ever-gray olive 
trees. One could easily have diverted 
enough water for that purpose from a stream 
which started above among the mountains, 
but now took a different course. 

Very useful false windows! There were 
petty annoyances here as elsewhere. There 
were little two-penny devils, so insignificant 
that one would think it cowardly to beat 
them or to send them with a kick to the 
father of lies; and a two-penny devil with 
his antics is positively amusing as one looks 
at him through the builder’s contrivances to 
promote symmetry. Possibly all trouble- 
some things have their funny side; at any 
rate, they seem to have when they do not 
put themselves directly in front of fifteen 
real lights. 


241 


XXV 

Seeing Corsica 

The little daughter’s third birthday 
brought a lot of merriment to the villa: 
gifts and more abundant kisses and a cake 
with iour candles, and a place at her par- 
ents’ table for herself; champagne for the 
servants ; an excursion planned for the small 
heroine (who slept most of the way), and all 
that sort of thing; and it was on that day, 
and owing to the peculiar nature of the 
day, that the Vincents made their memo- 
rable attempt to see Corsica. 

Vincent had waked before sunrise, and 
gone to the open window of his bedroom. 
The air was dry and light ; there was not a 
bit of mist on the horizon. ‘‘Such,” he 
said to himself, “are the proper conditions 
for seeing Corsica — at last.” The island is 
so distant that it is visible from San Remo 
only when the sun rises in a perfectly clear 
atmosphere. He had never succeeded in 
making it out up to that time ; in fact — but 
the result shall be told presently. 

242 


SEEING CORSICA 


His next thought was that, this being 
Baby's birthday, in honor of the occasion 
she had been put to sleep in her mother’s 
room, instead of the nursery. ‘‘And she 
is probably awake already, after the manner 
of such young people,” he thought; ‘‘at 
least it might be worth while to see.” So 
he crept downstairs from his den and lis- 
tened at their door. 

Yes ; at that moment he heard the rustling 
of bed-clothes and could fancy a tiny figure 
in white raising itself from a heap of warm 
coverlets — holding itself upright with a firm 
grasp on the railing of the crib — peering over 
toward the larger bed, perhaps pushing 
aside the curtains. Then ‘‘Nurse! nurse!” 
he heard the daughter call softly, not 
remembering where she was ; but suddenly, 
with glad recognition, changing to : 
‘‘Mamma! mamma, I am tired of this little 
crib; I want to come into your big bed.” 
Then he heard them both laugh merrily — 
both wide awake in an instant, without any 
drowsy transition. Then he knocked and 
cried, “Good morning!” 

In the early morning one is so keen for 
subtle pleasures! To hear the lock turned 
softly from within ; to have come from the 
243 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


roar of the surf and from the keen night air 
that had poured in through one’s open win- 
dow — then down a draughty flight of mar- 
ble steps — then into the still and luxurious 
atmosphere of this big bedroom, sweet with 
the odor of ^^Essenza di violetta di San 
Remo. ”... 

It was so dark in the room — the shutters 
being closed, and double curtains drawn till 
they overlapped and were then pinned 
together — that he lit a candle on the night- 
table. Forthwith the little three-year-old 
and the little twenty-odd-year-old began 
playing at shadow-pictures on the wall, and 
telling each other stories with these shadow 
pictures for illustrations — much cleverer, it 
seemed to Vincent, than the stories for 
children in books, for the mother’s were 
bright satires on people all three knew, 
making them all, even very stupid friends, 
seem entertaining, while the daughter put 
new life into worn-out rhymes by means of 
her quaint speech and pretty gestures and 
helpful perversions, singing: 

“ No matter z/you do, 

So your heart be true. . . 

And the last words that he uttered, 

As his hafener he fluttered, 

Were, ‘ My heart is true to Poll.’ ” 

244 


SEEING CORSICA 


But the common saying to the effect that 
good humor, rather than wit, makes good 
company, is never more true than when 
three are in one bed — however large; and 
much wiser people than the Vincents have 
found that before breakfast one is no less 
easily irritated than easily pleased. So we 
must hear a quaint saying of Baby’s that 
ended what threatened to become a serious 
argument between the two older members 
of the party. 

It was a question in regard to saddle- 
horses, Gloria holding that those of San 
Remo were fit to ride, and that she would 
like two of them ; Vincent maintaining that 
they were no better than saw-horses, and 
that if she would only wait a little while — 
etc. Now it happened that Baby had seen 
a jackass the day before, which had made 
her laugh — it was such a very small ass, 
with more than the usual length of ears 
and even less than the usual asinine tract- 
ability, although its driver was invoking all 
the saints, “oop-ing” and calling it his dear 
little *^Grisa,” as an appeal to its better 
nature. *‘Grisa” had made an impression 
on Baby’s fancy, and Baby was listening 
attentively as her parents discussed the pro- 
245 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


priety of having horses to ride. Finally she 
said : * * My word, mamma, I shotild like to 
have a picture of you when you are dwessed 
weady to get on your mule.” 

A good laugh at this brought back good 
humor, and then, to change the subject, 
‘^Speaking of pictures,” said Gloria, “I 
had a curious dream about those two empty 
picture frames in the dressing-room.” 

The frames she referred to were evidently 
intended to hold large portraits, but they 
now stared blankly at each other from oppo- 
site walls of her daintily furnished dressing- 
room, quite as though each had literally 
stared the other out of countenance. 

“I dreamt,” she continued, “that there 
was a flattering portrait of Mademoiselle 
Mora in one of the frames — at least I sup- 
pose it must have been flattering, for it 
made her quite good-looking; and in the 
other frame was — what do you suppose?” 

“Her sweetheart, naturally,” Vincent 
suggested. 

“Not a man at all, but only a scarecrow 
figure of a man. The head was a squeezed- 
out orange, his legs were burnt matches, 
his body was a sponge and his arms were 
leeches. Above the hole in the orange that 
246 


SEEING CORSICA 


represented his mouth he had two big, star- 
ing, greedy eyes.” 

”A curious dream, indeed,” Vincent 
said; ”and there is some truth in it, too, as 
I will tell you another time. Baby would 
hardly understand the story, and she herself 
is to be our heroine to-day.” 

”So now. Miss Three-year-old,” he con- 
tinued, ^‘will you just look hard at the wall 
there where you and mamma have been 
making shadow-pictures, and tell me what 
you see.” 

”But I don’t see anything there now — ” 
with disappointment. 

“There is a window on the outside of 
that wall, just where you are looking,” 
Vincent said. “It doesn’t come through 
the wall, you know. It is only a false win- 
dow, with shutters you can’t open, and 
stone or brick — I’m sure I don’t know 
which — behind the shutters. Now, as I 
look through this false window I see — ” 

Here Vincent held a taper that he found 
on the night-table near the candle so that 
its long thin shadow was cast on the wall. 

“I see a long straight path in Hyde Park, 
that leads from Hyde Park Corner almost 
to the Water- works at the head of the Ser- 


247 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


pentine in Kensington Gardens, where 
you and nurse used to feed the ducks.” 

”Yes, and ducks and peacocks and — such 
a many ducks!” cried Baby, now thoroughly 
interested. 

know the diagonal walk you mean,” 
said Gloria; “it ends at Victoria Gate on 
the Bayswater side.” 

“Well, then,” Vincent went on, “you 
remember it was just a long walk and not a 
very pretty one — with a few scrubby trees 
here and there, and little else worth looking 
at — only a great big piece of land that peo- 
ple make shocking use of. But now look 
through the false windows, and you will 
see — ’ ’ 

Here Vincent cast another shadow on the 
wall, to illustrate his meaning as well as he 
could. 

“You will see a very great and very beau- 
tiful building, the largest and most useful in 
all the world, that rises near the centre of 
the park, where that diagonal path used to 
pass — in fact, the path is there still, and 
goes right through the building, as you 
notice ; only — such a change ! Suppose we 
were at Lancaster Gate, and were starting 
out for a walk together — ” 

248 


SEEING CORSICA 

"‘Not at this season, thanks,” said Gloria. 
“Fog!” 

“I’d wather be here and see the flowers, ’ ’ 
from Baby. 

“And so you could see the same flowers 
and find the same season there, by going a 
short walk to the Paradise ; that is the name 
of the big building. No matter at what 
time in the year, you would be sure to find 
the right season, and no end of beautiful 
plants there. Eden was the name given to 
a garden like this, ever so long ago; and 
the Garden of Eden is said to have had 
something around it that kept out the cold 
winds and the storms. And the two people 
who lived in that garden were perfectly 
happy and strong, and all the beasts that 
lived there were well and kind, and all the 
plants there had sweet fruit or pretty flow- 
ers — just because the bad weather could 
not get in to spoil the people and the 
plants, and to make the beasts savage be- 
cause it was so hard for them to find their 
food. 

“Of course, the Paradise in Hyde Park is 
a great deal pleasanter than the Garden of 
Eden, because there are more things to see 


249 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


and more things to do; and isn’t it fine to 
walk right out of all the cold and the damp 
and the smoke of London into a garden 
that’s as warm as our little garden here — 
only a great deal prettier and a very great 
deal larger?” 

But Vincent was not able to go on with 
the description, for at this point his illus- 
trative shadow on the wall began to fade 
away, and at the same time to grow larger — 
or no, to be replaced by another much 
larger shadow that was cast from the oppo- 
site side of the room. 

”Why not have your building larger?” 
the new shadow seemed to suggest as it 
became more and more distinctly outlined 
on the wall. ”Why should not a whole 
town have something around it to keep out 
the cold winds and the storms?” 

The new shadow was cast by some object 
near the window. The sun was up so far 
that its light forced itself even through the 
close-drawn curtains. 

And Corsica? — Too late to look for it 
then. The right moment, the moment of 
sunrise, had passed. 


250 


SEEING CORSICA 


Margherita came to say, in her agreeable 
voice, that hot water was ready in the 
dressing-room. 

Afterward, when people assured the Vin- 
cents that Corsica might be seen at sunrise, 
they could only reply, “Indeed?” 


251. 


XXVI 

Why the House was Let 

The Promenade was a wide, unshaded 
pavement, separated from the highway on 
the one side by a narrow plantation of date- 
palms, and on the other side separated by a 
strip of beach — rocky, shelving, covered 
with heaps of seaweed — from the Mediter- 
ranean. It was a principal lounging place, 
basking place and meeting place for the 
English colony at San Remo. ‘‘Where 
shall I meet you?” if asked in English, was 
pretty sure to elicit the answer, “Under a 
sun-umbrella on the Promenade” — for there 
was no large social club. There was, how- 
ever, a lawn-tennis club, with courts near 
the Promenade. 

One day Vincent was driving along by 
the Promenade, coming from tennis, in 
company with Gloria and Ravelli Cav. 
Alberto, maestro di musica. (He looked so 
grand in his new coat and a new felt hat, 
adorned with a watered-silk band, and worn 


253 


WHY THE HOUSE WAS LET 


cocked over his eyes, that we must give him 
his full title.) Their singing lesson finished, 
master and pupil had kindly driven down 
from Villa Mora to pick Vincent up at the 
tennis courts. 

In tennis flannels Vincent felt himself a 
poor fellow [for such fine company, besides 
acknowledging himself their debtor for so 
much courtesy. Therefore, in the usual 
fashion of poor debtors, he resolved to offer 
interest where he could not repay the prin- 
cipal obligation. 

Referring to the first striking figure they 
passed on the Promenade, “There goes the 
man himself!” said Vincent. 

It so happened that the person thus indi- 
cated was a tall, stout man, wrapped in a 
cloak, although the day was warm. Beneath 
the cloak his body appeared to be fat, but 
his legs were thin. His heavy mustache 
and imperial, covering a large part of his 
yellow face ; a certain air he had of being 
alone (I can’t describe it otherwise), of 
being a separate figure — of wishing to be 
represented by head and shoulders only, 
with the thin legs invisible — these things 
suggested the images one sees on coin of 
the realm. 


253 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


‘^He looks like Victor Emanuel,” said 
Ravelli; ‘Hhat is, like a very inferior Victor 
Emanuel.” 

“Like a Victor Emanuel the Ninety- 
Ninth,” Gloria suggested. 

“That is his name, ” Vincent said. “He 
shall be called Ninety-Nine from this 
instant. But it’s only by reason of mus- 
tachios and long hair that he resembles a 
great man. Take off mustachios and long 
hair, and what would his face look like?” 

“Round and yellow like an orange.” 

“And wrinkled like a squeezed orange, 
and legs like burnt matches, and so forth 
and so forth. Don’t you see? It is the 
man himself!” 

“But what man?” 

“Mademoiselle Mora’s lover — or rather, 
the man she once loved,” said Vincent; 
then continuing, “Signor Ravelli, do you 
know of anything romantic in connection 
with the villa that Mademoiselle Mora built, 
in which we are now living?” 

“Nothing whatever, signore. It is a 
new house. It takes time to make a ro- 
mance.” 

“Yes, it takes time; it takes a few min- 
utes at least,” Vincent said, and then called 

254 


WHY THE HOUSE WAS LET 


out to Michele to drive down to the harbor, 
only a short distance from where they were. 

As they were proceeding thither Vincent 
questioned Gloria on a subject they had 
spoken of before. 

^‘Was our villa not furnished in a surpris- 
ing way, considering that it was the prop- 
erty of a single lady?” 

^‘Yes, certainly. It seemed to be fur- 
nished for a family. That was the best 
part of it ; everything was there at hand for 
baby and nurse and all.” 

^^Even for me?” Vincent suggested. 

‘‘Quite so, even for you.” 

“And then,” Vincent continued, “those 
two picture-frames of the same pattern, 
without a sign of a picture in them, vacantly 
staring at each other from opposite sides of 
your dressing-room — ” 

But meantime they had come to the har- 
bor, and, walking along the pier, were capti- 
vated by the view of San Remo from that 
point. 

“There is our house!” cried Gloria. 
“How plainly we can see it! I wonder if 
that infamous grandeur called Baby is look- 
ing this way.” 

Turning to Ravelli, Vincent asked, “As 
255 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


far as we can see, east and west, what do 
you think the best situation for a house?” 

“Just where Madame is looking,” he 
replied. 

“So Mademoiselle Mora thought. She 
hoped it would please Ninety-Nine.” 

“Now I remember,” said Gloria; “I do 
believe I have seen that man pass our house 
once or twice — and stare in. Yes, I do 
remember him now. He stared like the 
orange-face in my dream.” 

“Quite natural conduct on his part, as 
you will agree when you know the story,” 
Vincent said. “The story is, that Made- 
moiselle Mora, about twenty years ago, had 
a lover — the man we passed just now on 
the Promenade. They wanted very much 
to marry each other, but at that time were 
both too poor. Mademoiselle Mora, as she 
now calls herself, was at that time called 
Carolina Fornari — or Fornari Carolina, to 
put the names in the order that is usual 
here. She was a plain little body, with 
soft eyes and an unusually large voice. 
Both she and the man you have named 
Ninety-Nine were natives of San Remo and 
children of small tradespeople. 

“Well, you see, after a tiresome engage- 
256 


WHY THE HOUSE WAS LET 


ment of several years’ duration, Ninety- 
Nine forsook poor Carolina in order to 
marry a woman with money. He had sev- 
eral children in course of time, but no busi- 
ness; he used up his wife’s money, and then 
tried to support himself by looking like the 
image on a coin — at least he seems to have 
done nothing else, and yet to have had a 
certain degree of currency, like a false coin 
that still has some purchasing power in the 
dark and on the sly. His wife died; he is 
still current; but whether his cloak hides 
tatters or not — as many holes as the sponge 
in your dream — I am not prepared to say. 

‘^Carolina went on the stage as a chorus 
girl. She had a little talent, and she 
worked hard. From the chorus she was 
promoted to minor parts, and finally served 
as prima donna assoluta in various provin- 
cial companies, making money and saving 
it — finally investing all her earnings in 
Riviera lands, which have risen in value 
enormously. ‘She is stingy — the Mora is,’ 
people in her profession used to say of her 
then, calling her by her stage name. She 
herself retained this stage name — with the 
addition Mademoiselle, because she made 
her first success in France — when she gave 
257 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


up singing. That was when more than two 
hundred thousand lire were placed to her 
credit at the banker’s.” 

^‘That rascal!” cried Ravelli, for his 
enemy the mayor was the banker referred 
to. 

snug little fortune for a single lady,” 
Vincent continued. ‘^And so the poor 
Fornari Carolina became rich Mademoiselle 
Mora, returned to her native place, and built 
that villa yonder — built it and furnished 
it for her old lover and his children. He 
was to know nothing of her plan until all 
the work had been finished ; but what pains 
she took to remember his tastes and have 
everything precisely as he would wish 1 
How often she trembled to think of the 
changes in his tastes which time must have 
wrought, but which she could not take into 
account! Would he like this or that 
arrangement? How could she tell? so many 
years having passed. Then, too, she would 
find herself blushing hotly when questions 
arose in regard to furnishing the bedrooms. 
Would he think her so very ugly? When 
made up on the stage some gentlemen had 
even admired her, and told her so — imperti- 
nently, as she thought. And so she had 
258 


WHY THE HOUSE WAS LET 

sent them all away with bitter words. But 
now it was a pleasure to remember that men 
had made love to her, for so one might 
again. And yet, and yet, off the stage, 
how plainly gray hairs do show around 
one’s temples ! 

‘‘When such painful doubts as these 
assailed her she would tell the master- 
builder to take his own time. ‘There was 
no hurry,’ she would say; ‘in fact, he 
might make such and such alterations in the 
original plans’ ; and several whimsical 
details in the arrangement of our house are 
due to Mademoiselle Mora’s fits of nervous 
irresolution. When she trembled to think 
what might happen, she invented these 
things, which we now notice as peculiar, to 
make more work and so postpone the day 
of fate. But again hope would rise and 
stir her heart with tender eagerness. Then 
the work could not be pushed on rapidly 
enough to please her. ‘Oh! never mind 
such trifles,’ she would cry impatiently, in 
reference to some time-consuming direction 
she had given. ‘Let us finish! Let us 
finish! Will the house be finished?' 

One sees evidence of this vacillation in the 
present condition of our house, of which 
259 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


some portions were most carefully done, 
while plainly other portions were hurried 
over. 

^'Finally all was ready, and the vases in 
every room were filled with flowers. Then 
Ninety-Nine came, having been summoned 
from Naples, whither he had wandered as a 
wandering fraud, and where he had found 
a great population of frauds like unto him- 
self. Among the Neapolitans he had almost 
felt himself an honest man. Baser counter- 
feits than he circulated freely in that beau- 
tiful and musical town. 

^‘So, after many years of separation and 
silence — forgetfulness on his part, loving 
purpose on hers — these two middle-aged 
people met.” 

^‘Well,” Gloria interrupted at this point, 
^‘what came of it?” 

‘‘Don’t you see?” Vincent said. “She 
had been cultivating mind and heart in her 
long unselfish effort for him, constantly 
holding in remembrance the young lover as 
she had known him — as an ordinary young 
man, neither beautiful nor ugly, neither 
wholly good nor wholly mean. As such it 
had been possible for her to love him ; and 
in her modesty she had been fearful only 
260 


WHY THE HOUSE WAS LET 


lest she herself had become unlovely. Her 
unchanged girlish love for the man had kept 
her from believing any reports to his discredit 
that had reached her ears. But now in one 
moment of approximation she found that 
he had sunk below quite as much as she 
had risen above the old level on which they 
had met and associated as equals. Then, 
too, he was physically so inferior to her — a 
well-preserved woman ; the marks of an 
ignoble life are so repulsive at first sight. 
He was now indelibly stamped with the 
character of — but no matter what. I don’t 
want to call the fellow any more bad names. 

‘‘Mademoiselle Mora did not call him 
hard names, but just shut up the house 
which she could not bear to live in after 
such a disappointment. Villa Mora was 
offered to be let, and I took it. Ninety- 
Nine remained in San Remo to walk in the 
public garden and on the Promenade as you 
just now saw him.” 

“Is that the end?” Gloria asked. 

“No, I don’t believe it is the end; in fact 
it’s likely we may see the end before we go 
away. 

“What do you mean? — that the story is 
actually true? I don’t believe a word of it. 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 

I believe you have been looking through 
those false windows of yours again. But 
how about her taking to the life of a beg- 
gar?” 

“That part I have not seen quite clearly 
as yet,” Vincent said. “I shall try to find 
out and tell you later.” 

^‘Oh, that is not an unheard-of thing,” 
Ravelli said. “I know of a countess who 
lives between here and Genoa. Her name 
escapes me at the moment, but I know she 
has a fine house, with stables, carriages, and 
horses — all elegant as you please — in one 
town, and begs in the streets of another.” 

Yes, but such a parallel case is not an 
explanation. 


262 


XXVII 

Pink and White Tickets 

At San Remo there is only a narrow strip 
of level ground between the mountains and 
the Mediterranean Sea; but this narrow 
strip is, as all the world knows, singularly 
blest in respect of a mild winter climate. 
In February the orange trees were laden 
with ripe fruit, while at the same time 
already beginning to blossom for another 
crop. The almond trees were in full bloom ; 
so were the mimosas; so were the roses in 
Vincent's garden ; so were the wild violets — 
fragrant wild violets. Nurse and Baby took 
a basket to fill with flowers when they went 
for a walk under the olive trees. 

But just above the town the mountain 
tops were covered with ice and snow. Not 
more than an hour of fast walking was needed 
to take one to the snow line. 

Vincent went from the villa up to the 
snow line, getting well into the region of icy 
263 


VENGEANClS Of THE FEMALE 


winds before eleven o’clock, and then 
descending about noon, with an intensified 
relish for all the warmth and verdure of the 
sheltered coast. It had been quite worth 
while, he thought, as he came down the 
steep and very rough mule path near Villa 
Mora — it had been worth while to face such 
bitter winds not alone because of that mag- 
nificent Alpine view one has near the sum- 
mit, but also because he had been so stung 
and cut and rasped by an hour of severe 
winter that he was quite ready to appreciate 
mild air — and luncheon^ — and other good 
things. 

Just after making this conventional obser- 
vation upon the salutary effects of sharp 
exercise, he saw an unconventional sight. 
Coming up the mule path, singing and 
laughing, was a party of four peasants, one 
of whom — an exceedingly pretty girl, a ripe 
product of the climate I have just been 
praising — had taken off her dress and was 
carrying it on her bare arm. But this did 
not seem an unconventional proceeding to 
her or to her companions. She wanted 
to make the ascent with greater comfort, 
that was all. 

A classical touch in the sunny hillside; 

264 


PINK AND WHITE TICKETS 


the fine, half-naked figure; the snow line 
just above. Excellent climate! 

As for the classical element here, remem- 
ber that until recently — until the highway 
and railway were opened — many of these 
villages had no communication with the out- 
side world, save by means of an occasional 
small trading vessel; and that even between 
village and village of the Riviera there was 
so little intercourse that the customs and 
costumes of one village might resemble 
those of Corsica rather than those of its 
nearest neighbor. So, of course, one finds 
Old-World traits among Ligurians; and per- 
haps it was an aboriginal impulse that 
Ninety-Nine obeyed when he came under 
the windows of Villa Mora one night. He 
had taken so much of the strong Corsican 
wine that he forgot at least two grave facts — 
that he was more of a wandering fraud than 
a wandering minstrel, and that Mademoiselle 
Mora no longer dwelt in the villa bearing 
her name. He began a serenade. Oje 
CaruW he sang first, as a delicate reminder 
of the days when he had called her Caroline 
or Caruli, and ''Oje Carult' intolerably. 
Next in a quavering voice he sang ^^PensOj'' 
and strove after impressive crescendo effects 
265 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


when he reached the words Ma tu — tu V hai 
scordato'' (‘^But thou — thou hast forgot- 
ten.”) 

And an archaic simjplicity was manifest 
in the unfortunate affair of the housemaid 
Margherita. 

Margherita was a woman of about thirty 
years, good-looking, virtuous, strong, and a 
thoroughly trained servant, with broad 
shoulders and a soft voice. Since she had 
been in the Vincents’ service her master 
and mistress had gladly referred to her as an 
example of steadiness and good sense. At 
least some of these people,” they had 
repeatedly said, ”are entirely reliable.” 
But one day Margherita tried to drown her- 
self in the well. Why? Because there had 
been some talk of marriage between her 
and a gardener at the Hotel Victoria. He 
told her that he intended to marry another 
woman ; so on his wedding day she became 
violently insane. Vincent took council 
with the best medical authorities, and they 
advised her removal from the house. Fits 
of melancholy alternating with violent par- 
oxysms followed the first outburst, and 
finally with much regret Vincent saw him- 
self obliged to adopt the foreign doctors' 
266 


PINK AND WHITE TICKETS 


advice. We don’t believe in such things 
nowadays, but evidently they happen in 
Liguria, and the contemplation of them puts 
one in the proper frame of mind for consid- 
ering the uses of the pink and white tickets. 

Vincent had received the following note: 

“House of Charity, 21, Corso Garibaldi, 21. 

“San Remo, January 8th. 

“ Dear Sir : I have been told that you expressed a 
desire of having some tickets to give to the poor. 

“ The (enclosed) pink tickets are good for soup and 
bread at I'l'A, and at in the evening, and for a 
night’s lodging. 

“The (enclosed) white tickets are good for three 
times. 

“ I hope you will excuse the liberty I take, but it is 
in the cause of charity and humanity. 

“ Any time you should like to visit my establishment, 
I shall have much pleasure in showing you over. 

“ Allow me to wish you and your family a Happy 
New Year. May it prove a prosperous one. 

“ I am, dear sir, 

“Yours very truly, 

“ , Priest.” 

In response he went to see Father , 

paid for the tickets he had sent, and 
inquired into the methods employed, finding 
him a very pleasant old gentleman, whose 
face seemed unaccountably familiar until 
Vincent recognized in him the priest he had 
seen in a draper’s shop, bargaining, with 
267 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


his housekeeper’s assistance, for merino 
undershirts. 

‘‘Your system is like that of charity 
organization in America?” Vincent asked 
after explaining the design in organized 
charity as well as he could. 

“Yes,” rather doubtfully. 

“In other words, you intend to relieve all 
cases of genuine distress, but to investigate 
and expose fraudulent cases and profes- 
sional beggars ?’ ’ 

“No,” replied the other quite frankly. 
“We want to provide for everybody who 
applies to us. If they need food or shelter 
their need is a sufficient argument.” 

“ It is like the old monastic system, then ?’ ’ 

“Precisely. We can’t do just what the 
church to which you owe your charity 
organization system — the English Church — 
does, you know; for in England the church 
is a morality-school, while in Italy it is 
the common home. Our children play 
marbles on the altar steps during mass. I 
wanted to stop that once, but the parents 
were enraged, and accused me of meaning 
to turn them out of their ‘natural home.’ ” 

The amount of this was, then, that the 
House of Charity, under an illusive appear- 
268 


PINK AND WHITE TICKETS 


ance of conformity with modern ideas, 
revived the practice of indiscriminate alms- 
giving through which, during the Middle 
Ages, monastic establishments fostered pau- 
perism and increased the influence of Rome. 

I don’t mean that such unscrupulous 
charity is wholly bad. Charity is such a 
good noun that it blesses even any long, 
disqualifying adjective you can write be- 
fore it. 

From the Vincents’ point of view the 
chief trouble was that, now that they had 
these tickets, the door-bell rang from morn- 
ing till night, and from time to time the 
maid — poor Margherita’s successor — would 
come, saying in French something that 
sounded like, *^Sir, ’tis a poor person who 
demands a ticket.” 

No, I don’t mean that it is wholly bad, 
but — but — just think what these Ligurians 
are already, without any further encourage- 
ment to beg. They are not actually poor, 
you know. The poorest may have a cabin 
and a bit of land to cultivate, not too far 
from a good market for fruit and vege- 
tables; in fact, many of the poorest-looking 
beggars actually have their cabin and gar- 
den in a snug nook on the hillside, making 
269 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


a good profit in that way, and begging 
besides. So they are doubly rich. But 
they inherit a taste for begging, and have 
no sense of the shame of it — a thing hard 
for us to understand, yet literally true. 
Even in out-of-the-way places a child just 
learning to walk will instinctively put out 
its hand when a stranger passes; it must be 
taught to walk, but begs by instinct. 

The system that Father upheld 

seemed to Vincent well adapted to the 
tastes of the people, but not so well adapted 
to their needs. ^‘They need lessons in 
self-respect,” he said, '‘more than they 
need pink or white tickets for soup and 
bread and lodging. Lovable, fascinating 
people they are, with their high notes in 
music and character. But this blessed 
climate does not encourage such stern vir- 
tues as self-reliance, and we must acknowl- 
edge that eccentric conduct is a little too 
common here; that the best Ligurians for- 
get what is due to their own character a 
little too easily ; and your church must hold 
itself partly responsible for this inveterate 
begging habit. Really, now, there is too 
much of it. Why, even an admirable 
woman like Mademoiselle Mora, who made 


270 


PINK AND WHITE TICKETS 


her way in life by honest hard work, put all 
her money into real property, and then took 
to begging, sir — begging in the roads, and 
made up to look like an old hag. She must 
have sucked the trick of it with her mother’s 
milk, for her mother’s parents had done the 
same thing on a small scale, having a nice 
little place near Bussana, which one parent 
cultivated while the other went out in rags 
to beg. Of course. Mademoiselle Mora 
wouldn’t have "done it if she hadn’t been 
disappointed in her lover at forty and cheated 
of her reward in life ; but to turn cynic to 
quite such an extent, to drop from her high 
note to roadside notoriety — why, sir, this 
conspicuous example of a common practice 
suggests to me that you ought to cast the 
weight of your influence against the prac- 
tice, unless, indeed, it shows that there may 
be more fun in begging than we suppose. 

To this effect Vincent expressed himself; 
but a few days later at the villa he was 
heard to say: “Here comes the maid again. 
Another poor person who demands relief, 
eh? Well! Well, I must send to Father 
for some more pink and white tickets. 


271 


XXVIII 

At the Casino 

One of the memorable drives they took 
was that to Monte Carlo. 

The highway between San Remo and 
Vintimiglia is interesting merely, but from 
that point onward becomes superb, with a 
constant view of the sea on one hand, and 
on the other mountain slopes, very grand 
yet very kind-looking, with their terraced 
sides so fruitful. Vincent rode part of the 
way on the box with Michele, whom he 
unfeignedly liked as a fine, hardy specimen, 
scorning gloves, top-coat, and lap-robe. He 
told Vincent a delicious story about a cer- 
tain Baron C , a Russian, who used to 

live at San Remo part of each year. 

It appears that this noble Russian would 
drive over to Monte Carlo now and then to 
play at the Casino. Sometimes he would 
drive back in the same style, and then the 
good people of San Remo when they saw 
him returning, would exclaim, ^^Ecco! the 
272 


AT THE CASINO 


Baron C has won.” But more fre- 

quently he would hire for the return trip an 
old broken-down carriage, with a single 
limping horse, which he could get for almost 
nothing — that is, for the little money he 
had left after playing. Then would the 
shop-keepers in Victor Emanuel Street 
shake their forefingers with an expressive 
backward turn, signifying, ^^The Baron 

C has lost. Alas!” Once he gained 

forty thousand francs; whereupon he hired 
sixteen asses, hitched them tandem-wise to 
a bath-chair, and seated in this bath-chair 
drove his sixteen asses through Victor 
Emanuel Street. For a few moments the 
scene was like the height of carnival; then 
a sudden hush fell upon the town, for every 
one was busily writing. By the next mail 

Baron C received from every tradesman 

in San Remo an invitation to inspect his 
wares without charge (Ingresso libero). 

Another of Michele’s stories was as fol- 
lows : 

Almost any day you may see on Victor 
Emanuel Street a little hairless Frenchman. 
He was a rich man when he married, and 
took his bride from Paris to the Riviera for 
their honeymoon. They visited the Casino 

273 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


and played, and lost every franc of their 
united fortunes. He did not shoot her and 

hang himself, this little Monsieur X , 

but he just got very sick and then got well 
again. When he recovered he found him- 
self without a hair on his head or face. He 
came to San Remo and began to give les- 
sons in French, while Madame X set 

up a millinery shop. His fortunes have 
begun to grow again — not so his hair. He 

had been literally and permanently fleeced. 
* * * 

An earthly paradise is Monte Carlo, 
surely. So exquisitely kept, so becomingly 
placed, the town is like one vast luxurious 
chamber with bright, warm mountain sides 
for its walls; while the Casino is like some 
women one sees, and sees with delight, who 
are too fine for every day, but delicious for 
a holiday or a ball. The master of this 
beautiful mistress Monte Carlo Casino lets 
her to a company for ten millions a year; 
and the company in turn lets her for ever so 
much more in money, and a number of 
lives, to the public. But of course most 
of the suicides ascribed to Mistress Casino’s 
baleful influence would occur elsewhere if 
she were not made so alluring. She allures a 
274 


AT THE CASINO 


lot of unfortunate, discouraged, weak- 
hearted people who are quite ready to die, 
promising them at least a glimpse of beauty 
and a bare chance of fortune. Those are 
mostly useless lives that are just thrown 
away as indifferently as one knocks ashes 
out of a pipe, merely because Mistress 
Casino has won. No record is kept of the 
people who have gained new hope and new 
interest in life from looking at Mistress 
Casino’s beauty and sharing her gay society 
for a few hours. This is a highly immoral 
sentiment, is it not? Bah! It does no 
good to strain the truth in order to empha- 
size our private prejudices. Mistress Casino 
is bad enough, but suppose we allow for the 
good she does and look fairly into her fair 
face. Beautifully dishonest Monte Carlo! 
Among towns you are as Phryne was among 
women. You will probably be acquitted 
by those judges who have seen you; you 
will be wholly condemned only by those 
who have not seen you. 

At one of the roulette tables they saw a 
lady whom both Vincent and his friend 
Maranato recognized at the same moment. 

She was comfortably seated, while most 
of the players near her were standing; her 
275 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


money was stacked in two neat gold columns 
on the table before her, one of these col- 
umns representing (in twenty-franc pieces) 
the amount she had decided to stake that 
day, while the other represented her win- 
nings; she noted the recurrence of certain 
numbers in a little book she kept for this 
purpose ; and her quietly observant manner 
gave further evidence of her being an 
habituee. But she was far from having the 
curved back, sallow face and greedy eyes 
that novelists apparently find at every gam- 
ing table; on the contrary, she was just a 
plump and neatly dressed body who would 
have looked well presiding over weak tea 
and thin bread and butter, and as for her 
complexion, that was decidedly fine, unless 
perhaps a trifle too ruddy. Her neck, 
where beauty lingers in middle life as the 
summer lingers in certain sheltered places, 
was especially pretty — round and smooth 
and firm, with one small coquettish black 
dot below the left ear, which nature must 
have added as a happy thought after finish- 
ing an otherwise too simple figure. 

“Odd!” said Maranato, calling Vin- 
cent’s attention to this lady. “I think 
I’ve seen her before somewhere — on the 
276 


AT THE CASINO 


stage, I believe, although she looks domes- 
tic enough. Now I remember; in Lyons 
four years ago. She was singing in the 
‘Barber of Seville.* Very good voice, too, 
but not much of an actress.” 

“Odd!” Vincent repeated. “So have I 
seen her before — a few months ago, sitting 
by me in the carriage — dressed like an old 
beggar woman. She didn’t act the part 
especially well on that occasion either. I 
am quite sure it is Mademoiselle Mora.” 


277 


XXIX 

One Effect of a Delicious Climate 

Several times Vincent was tempted to 
force the interest of the curious little 
romance which had been growing under his 
observation. Mademoiselle Mora was such 
an enigmatical character that he wanted to 
find out the whole truth about her; and she 
was to him so original and novel — withal so 
sympathetic in her way of doing things, 
obeying a high sense of duty” for half her 
life, and afterward apparently following 
mere whims, with absolute contempt for 
anybody’s and everybody’s sense of 
duty” — that he was impatient to understand 
her at once. But then he realized that this 
would be foolish. The romance was grow- 
ing without labor, quietly and steadily and 
as fast as he could understand it. The 
studies he made of other Ligurians aided 
him from day to day more and more fully to 
understand Mademoiselle Mora’s nature — 
for she seemed to be a genuine Ligurian 
278 


ONE EFFECT, ETC. 


type; while she, in turn, thus uniting in her 
single person his haphazard observations, 
rendered all her fellow-Ligurians more 
intelligible. So she lent a warm personal 
color to what might otherwise have been 
but cold generalizations; he liked her 
exceedingly, perhaps for the very reason 
that she piqued his curiosity; and, in fine, 
he decided that he would do much better if 
he continued to let the information he de- 
sired come quite unsought. 

And quite unsought it did continue to 
come — as, for example, when one of the 

office boys,” dining with the Vincents, 
entertained them by recounting an adven- 
ture of which Mademoiselle Mora was the 
heroine. 

The ” office boys,” I must explain, were 
the lieutenants in the battalion of Bersaglieri 
stationed at San Remo. They happened to 
be rather young looking, most of them ; so 
before Gloria and Vincent knew any of 
them personally they began to call these 
young officers “office boys.” Since they 
had met some of them at the public balls 
during the winter, the officers seemed to 
enjoy coming to Villa Mora, and the Vin- 
cents liked to have them. They were so 


279 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


entirely official, stanaped and branded 
officer-or-nothing, that Vincent still used 
this form of expression in speaking of these 
very nice and agreeable young gentlemen. 
One of them, however, was called “Gar- 
dener, ’ ’ owing to the following circumstance. 
He was a captain in the regiment, and but 
little thought of by his fellow-officers, as 
his manner was gruff and his disposition 
rather unfriendly. Now, it happened that 
a short time before this captain had found 
himself at a large ball, called the “Eye- 
Ball” — the proceeds from the sale of tick- 
ets being devoted to the support of an 
ophthalmic hospital. Gloria had noticed 
him as a lonely fellow, and expressed a wish 
to have him presented to her. One of the 
“office boys” took a message to that effect, 
but soon returned with a very red face to 
say that the captain declined the honor! 
Thereupon Vincent interposed, sending the 
“office boy” back to correct the previous 
message. “It was not his wife,” he ex- 
plained, “but himself who had wanted to 
see the captain, as he was looking for a 
gardener to take care of his grounds. The 
work was easy, and no references required. 
Would the captain like the situation?” The 
2 So 


ONE EFFECT, ETC. 


captain’s apologies were offered, and of 
course it came out that he had misunderstood 
the first message. 

The Vincents were dining four of the 
“office boys,’’ together with Captain “Gar- 
dener,’’ the prefect of the department, with 

his charming Roman wife, and Lady F 

and her two daughters. 

Lieutenant C , a Venetian, spoke in 

broken French to the English ladies, but 
in very musical Italian to Vincent. “There 
are three periods in a feast,’’ said he: “one, 
silentium — that is before the good cheer 
begins to cheer; two, stridentiuni ' (this 
he illustrated by tapping his teeth) — “that 
is when the best work is done.’’ 

“And what is the third period?’’ asked 
the prefect. 

Lieutenant C said he would tell 

when they came to it ; but when that time 
arrived, he had forgotten his promise, and 
the prefect had forgotten his question. 

Lieutenant C had a term for ladies of 

exuberant figure, “Senatus Populusque 
RomanuSy'' he said, tapping his own full 
chest. 

Lieutenant G , who had once been in 

Paris, kept laughing at Lieutenant C ’s 

281 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


French. That made him appear to be quite 
witty. 

Lieutenant M looked placidly happy. 

Lieutenant R , the vivacious, did not 

know a word of English, but was often 
invited to entertainments in the English 
colony; and being a punctilous society man, 
he kept on hand three model English notes — 
one of acceptance, one of regret and one of 
condolence. By a quite natural mistake 
he once sent the note of condolence in reply 
to an invitation to afternoon tea. It is not 
enough to say that many Italians hate tea. 
They do not know what to do with it, but 
they will sniff it wonderingly, as though to 
ask, *'ls it something for the hair?” 

Lieutenant R has learned with 

heartfelt sorrow,” etc. 

Such was his answer when invited to 
afternoon tea. 

It was this Lieutenant R who nar- 

rated the adventure with Mademoiselle 
Mora to which I have referred — a most 
singular story, I must say, but told very 
convincingly. 

He began by holding out at arm’s length 
a black-and-white mask that was by his 
plate; for the carnival being now near at 
2S2 


ONE EFFECT, ETC. 


hand, Gloria had thought it appropriate to 
have the menu written on the inside of 
masks, one for each guest. 

'‘It is evident,” he said, “that our hos- 
tess has had the kind thought to provide us 
with masks for the veglione di gala, ’ ’ — the 
veglione di gala being the first masked ball 
of the carnival season. “Now, when we 
get heated in dancing with these masks on, 
we shall have the menu printed on our 
foreheads. It will be printed backward, of 
course, and so nobody else can read it; but 
we shall be able to see what we have had 
to-night by looking into a mirror.” 

Everybody laughed at this whimsical 
idea; and having thus secured general 
attention he continued : 

“This black-and-white mask is just like a 
person I met at Monte Carlo, for the per- 
son had two characters as different as the 
black half of this mask is different from 
the white half. You see, I rather got into 
trouble lately for lack of money, and so 
I thought I’d try my luck at the Casino. I 
need not explain the circumstances, but the 
fact is I had never played before, and 
should not have done so but for very pressing 
reasons. Well, I managed to borrow nine 
283 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


hundred francs among my friends — Lieu- 
tenant M and the captain could tell you 

where I got some of it — said good-by as 
though I didn’t expect to come back, and 
took the train for Monte Carlo. I went in 
civilian’s clothes, of course, as we officers 
are forbidden to play. Reaching Monte 
Carlo about the middle of the afternoon, I 
went directly to the Casino, which is only 
a few steps from the station, as you know. 
Like a genuine beginner and greenhorn I 
had worked out a scheme on the way, and 
was so confident of success that when a beg- 
gar woman, a sympathetic poor creature, 
asked for charity as I was about to enter 
the Casino Garden I handed her a ten-franc 
note. ‘If I win,’ I said to myself, ‘what 
shall I care for a small matter like ten 
francs; and if I lose, the money will do 
more good in her hands than in the 
Casino bank. Besides, it may bring me 
luck. Pity she hasn’t a hump that I can 
rub my purse on.’ But I didn’t really 
believe I could lose. 

‘ ‘ I was in the salle de jeu little more than 
one hour. I had lost everything — all this 
borrowed money. I had a queer, numb 
feeling as I stood there at the big table for 
284 


ONE EFFECT, ETC. 


a few minutes longer, looking on at the play 
I couldn’t take part in any more. One 
Austrian, I remember, was staking a thou- 
sand francs each time, and winning again 
and again and again. But somehow these 
big sums didn’t make my own debts seem 
any smaller. I could have choked that 
lucky Austrian. I felt as though somebody 
were choking me. Well, I got out of the 
rooms, and then, not caring which way I 
went, naturally turned down the way I had 
come, toward the station. And here 
begins the strange part of it all. 

‘ ‘ That old beggar was still at her trade in 
the same place. I felt her eyes on me the 
minute I came in sight, although it was 
already growing dark, and wondered if she 
would have the impertinence to ask me for 
something more. And sure enough she 
did! She asked me to do her a favor! 

“As I was about to pass her she stopped 
me by holding out a letter with a trembling 
hand. ‘Would the sweet young gentleman 
drop that in the post-box at the station for 
a poor old lame, sick creature? And would 
he graciously see, when he got to the light 
at the station, if the address was written 
so that one could read it? A poor old 
285 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


woman’s hand would shake so, especially 
when she was writing to her dear son.’ I 
just took the letter without thinking or 
caring, and went on; but when I got to 
the light I did remember to look at the 
address. 

“It was addressed to me! My full name, 
the battalion, San Remo, all in a clear, neat 
hand. So even if I had dropped it in the 
box it would have reached me. 

“I tore open the envelope, and found 
inside my ten-franc note folded in a thou- 
sand-franc note, and both in a half-sheet of 
paper, on which was the single word inter- 
est.’ 

“A moment of doubt, of bewilderment; 
then I turned and went quickly up the path 
again. The old woman was gone! 

“I ran through the Casino Garden, up 
and down, everywhere. Still no extraordi- 
nary old woman. 

“Then I tried the nearest streets, and 
with better success; for just before reaching 
the Hotel Prince de Galles I caught sight of 
her as she stood before a gate and fumbled 
in the pocket of her wretched old gown for 
a key. But before I could come up with 
her, the key was found, and the gate opened 
286 


ONE EFFECT, ETC. 


and then shut in my face. She was gone 
once more. 

“It seemed to be a servants’ entrance, or 
private entrance, to a bright little villa — 
this gate through which she had passed. 
What could I do? Ring the door-bell and 
be refused admittance? Or wait where I 
was for this peculiar old person’s reappear- 
ance? I had about decided to take the lat- 
ter course, when I saw the words Willa 
Mora’ cut in the stone gate-post. The 
name struck me at once, owing to what I 
had heard of the eccentric conduct of the 
San Remo Mademoiselle Mora, and added 
fuel to my burning curiosity. As it is cus- 
tomary in these parts to give the proprie- 
tor’s name to the villa, I asked myself if 
this could be the same person. Without 
more ado I marched boldly up to the front 
door; rang: said I had called to see ‘M — 
Mora,’ mumbling the title so that the 
servant might understand Monsieur Mora or 
Madame or Mademoiselle, as the case hap- 
pened to be; sent in my name, and was 
admitted. 

“After I had been kept waiting an unrea- 
sonably long time, as I thought, a pleasant- 
looking lady entered the drawing-room. 

287 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


She was a quiet and intensely respectable 
sort of lady, you know ; and when she 
politely said she was Mademoiselle Mora, and 
then waited for me to explain my visit, I 
wished myself on the Red Sea fighting 
black savages. What could I say? That I 
wanted to restore a thousand francs to an 
old beggar who had entered by this lady’s 
gate? That, I thought, would have 
sounded too ridiculous in her ears — she 
being evidently a common-sense body. But 
as I stood hesitating, confused, stammering 
out excuses, she took pity on me. 

^ Would the sweet young gentleman 
drop this letter in the box for a poor, lame, 
sick creature?’ she said in the voice and with 
the gesture of the beggar. 

^‘So this quiet-looking lady and the beg- 
gar were one and the same — or rather, her 
character was made of the union of these 
two characters, just as the mask I am hold- 
ing is made of black silk and white in equal 
parts.” 

At this point Lieutenant R discon- 

tinued his story, evidently thinking he had 
already made it at least long enough for a 
table-talk anecdote; but as the men sat 
smoking after the ladies had withdrawn, the 
338 


ONE EFFECT, ETC. 


prefect, who took a professional interest in 
all such matters, questioned him rather too 
critically, asking: How did she happen to 
know his name, and that he was in need of 
money? What was her motive in giving 
him the thousand francs, and did she seem 
willing to take it back? Finally, why 
should a rich woman turn beggar, except 
with some unlawful purpose? 

Such an interrogatory must have irri- 
tated Lieutenant R somewhat, but he 

stood too much in awe of the prefect as one 
of the chief officials of that region to refuse 
to answer. Possibly he would have been 
willing to leave the impression that Made- 
moiselle Mora had long been sensible of his 
personal attractions, had made inquiries 
about him in San Remo, and on seeing him 
enter the Casino had assumed that he would 
lose, and made her preparations accordingly. 
That would have been a highly romantic 
and flattering version of the incident ; and 
an amiable Italian officer loves to figure in 
some flattering romance. The prefect’s 
direct questioning, however, soon elicited 
the contrary. Mademoiselle Mora, it ap- 
peared, had indeed been interested in him, 
had made inquiries about him, and had 
289 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


sought an opportunity to make him her 
friend, but with no thought of making him 
at the same time her lover. On the con- 
trary her interest was to be explained as fol- 
lows: Lieutenant R and Mademoiselle 

Mora’s old sweetheart lived in the same 
building in the Via Umberto, the former 
on the first floor, the latter in the garret; 
and the lieutenant was about the only 
respectable person who was willing to be 
seen in company with poor old Ninety- 
Nine. Mademoiselle Mora had noticed this 
proof of good-heartedness on the offlcer’s 
part. She could not yet bring herself to 
communicate directly with the walking 
fraud, but she conceived the plan of aid- 
ing him through the young gentleman. 

Here I must give Lieutenant R ’s own 

words. 

“Just fancy!” said he. “She actually 
looked on me as a good influence. It was 
the first time I had ever seen myself in that 
light. She asked me a thousand questions 
about the old duffer; instructed me to keep 
him supplied with money, so that he might 
not be tempted to do anything very bad ; 
promised to send me so-and-so-much each 
month to be dribbled out to him, and 


290 


ONE EFFECT, ETC. 


begged me to keep the thousand francs. 
*She was treatii% me with the liberty of an 
old friend’s friend, and it would be a great 
kindness to her if I should treat her in the 
same way, borrowing from her, who had 
more than she needed, whenever I might 
have less than I required.’ Well, I must say 
she showed keen insight into human nature ; 
for if she had approached me in any 
ordinary way and made such a proposition 
I should have had nothing to do with it. 
As it was, I was so completely fascinated 
by the strange situation in which I found 
myself and by the surprise of it all, and the 
sudden relief from anxiety was so grateful 
to me, coming immediately after my loss, 
that I just accepted her offer. I could only 
kiss her hand by way of thanks, but I should 
have liked to hug her.” 

The prefect, when he heard this, wore 
one of his fine smiles which signify polite 
but most positive incredulity. “That may 
all be as you say,” he commented, 
“although it looks to me like a marriage- 
trap set to catch you, my young friend. 
Mademoiselle Mora has reached the age 
when ladies become desperately anxious to 
be married. My advice to you is not to 


291 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


have such compromising interviews too 
often. But how about my last question? 
How do you explain her wandering around 
like a gipsy here and there and everywhere 
between Monte Carlo and San Remo, or 
even beyond?” 

Thoroughly provoked by the doubt cast 
upon his statement, Lieutenant R re- 

plied quite hotly: “Your own mode of life 
is so different, sir, that I doubt your being 
able to understand the charm — the absolute 
freedom, the variety, the adventurous qual- 
ity — in thus ‘ wandering around like a gipsy, ’ 
as you call it. Probably Mademoiselle 
Mora inherits a taste for that sort of thing, 
while the taste for disguises was cultivated 
during her career on the stage. She told 
me herself that humdrum respectability was 
very insipid after having been an artiste. 
Now just suppose she tried to ^wander 
around’ dressed as a lady; what would be 
the consequences? You, as the chief 
magistrate of police, know that she would 
not be safe for a single hour. She must 
transform herself into a poor, ugly old 
woman to keep from being robbed and 
insulted ; so, like a sensible and thorough- 


292 


ONE EFFECT, ETC. 


going creature, she makes the disguise as 
complete as possible, and, to make it the 
more complete and natural, pretends to 
beg, or actually does beg, keeping the 
money she gets or generously giving it away, 
just as she sees fit. I declare to you, when 
I think of an open-air life in this delicious 
climate and lovely country, I am tempted 
to turn roadside beggar myself. In her old 
gown and with her face stained, Mademoi- 
selle Mora is as free as a wild animal, yet 
absolutely secure, and with two or three 
snug lairs, called villas, to afford pleasing 
variety. There is a clever woman for you ! 
Instead of trying to force herself upon her 
aristocratic neighbors, in the hope of secur- 
ing a good social position — a thing that 
would be difficult for the child of simple 
tradespeople, and a thing that could scarcely 
have made her happy even if she had tried 
and been successful — she just lets herself be 
happy in her own way. Ecco!"' 

* * * 

The other guests went away at eleven 
o’clock, but the officers after twelve, as 
among themselves it is regarded as an inti- 
mation that one has not enjoyed the even- 


293 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


ing if one goes before midnight. Delight- 
ful fellows! So anxious to please and so 
eager to be pleased! Wearing their smart 
new gloves until they were seated at the 
table; saluting each other with the sharp 
little word ‘ ‘ Ciao! 


294 


XXX 

Intimations During the Carnival 

In the following terms Vincent was 
invited to take part in the carnival festivi- 
ties: 

“ Monsieur, — J’ai Thonneur de vous annoncer votre 
nomination k Membre honoraire du Comitd pour les 
fetes du Carnaval qui auront lieu d^s le 28 f^vrier au 
5 mars prochains. Veuillez, Monsieur, donner avis 
de votre aimable ad^sion k la Pr^sidence du Comity. 

Le Secretaire, Le President, 

A. . J. B. 

The real meaning of this invitation was so 
plain that, before replying, Vincent asked: 
How much does it cost to be a member of 
your committee? But he gave what the 
secretary called ^‘adesion.” Like Mr. Tas- 
well Langdon, this secretary had raided 
several languages, and added to his store of 
words the products of casual depredations 
beyond the Italian border. On his card 
was printed: 

“A teacher at the technical schools and at the 
tyi-Scuole magistrali femminili of San Remo since 

295 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


eighteen years, has resumed his particular lessons of 
Italian and french. 

“ Daily, weekly, or monthly accords.” 

* * * 

When does carnival begin? 

Vincent put this question to Lieutenant 

R , and he replied: After Christmas. 

Between Christmas and the beginning of 
Lent is carnival season.” 

And it was true that ever since Christ- 
mas San Remo had worn more or less of 
the holiday aspect. Balls, public and pri- 
vate, had been numerous, the shops had 
looked somewhat more shoppy, and the 
local dandies had worn their local finery with 
a smarter air. So, also, shortly after New 
Year’s Day, there were posters in all the 
streets, announcing in French, English, Ger- 
man, Italian, and the dialect of San Remo: 
‘^He is born!” — meaning King Carnival. 

But the peculiarly carnivalesque celebra- 
tions began on the last day of February. 
Then King Carnival (called Gianduja) him- 
self came to town. This merry monarch, 
with a company of maskers from other 
cities, arrived by train at quarter-past two 
in the afternoon of February 28th. The 
president of the committee, in robes of state, 
296 


DURING THE CARNIVAL 

received these welcome guests at the sta- 
tion, while all the floating population of the 
expectant little city had drifted to the same 
point. King Gianduja and his courtiers 
descended from their saloon - carriage, 
passed through the waiting-room, which 
was decorated with Oriental carpets and 
exotic flowers, and appeared on the outer 
platform of the station, where the munici- 
pal guard in full-dress uniform was drawn 
up in double line to do them honor. 

Now, I think it necessary to state that 
the municipal guard, as it was called, con- 
sisted of a handful of policemen, whose full- 
dress was a glazed tall hat and black frock 
coat ; but it must be understood throughout 
this description that the carnival at San 
Remo was in miniature. 

When the maskers emerged from the 
station the populace gave them a rousing 
ovation. Handkerchiefs were fluttered, 
flags waved, hats tossed high in air. Ap- 
plause and cheers testified to the universal 
satisfaction, while ‘Hears of happiness,” if 
we may credit the statement of a local news- 
paper, “were shed by the guests as they, 
humble amid such glory, ascended the 
superb chariot of the committee.” 

297 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


The marine band played '‘God save the 
carnival,” after which the procession made 
its triumphant entry into Victor Emanuel 
Street, while church bells rang out merrily, 
and from their lofty position in the grand 
stand the town musicians blew their loudest 
to increase this confusion of joyous sounds. 
Behind King Gianduja’s chariot other deco- 
rated cars and carriages fell into line, and so 
the festival began. 

It was not a splendid show, like the Bat- 
tle of Flowers at Nice, but the Vincents 
thought more of it because they knew the 
actors, almost all of them by sight and many 
by name. So it was not merely attractive 
as a pageant, but interesting because it 
showed acquaintances in a new light. 

The procession of allegorical chariots, car- 
riages decorated with flowers and bunting, 
maskers on foot, and a swarm of ragged 
boys who picked up the bouquets as they 
fell and sold them again to the merry-mak- 
ers, passed slowly along Victor Emanuel 
Street to Columbus Place, and so back 
again in an unbroken line. Thus one had 
the opportunity to salute all his acquaint- 
ances who took part in the procession, as 
well as those who had stationed themselves 
298 



CARNIVAIv AT SAN REMO 



.! 


DURING THE CARNIVAL 


on balconies or in windows commanding 
the course, or who were being jostled by the 
excited throng on the pavements. A pleas- 
ant form of salutation, this, in which flowers 
are used to express the degrees of interest 
one feels; now a single bunch for some 
indifferent person, again half a dozen to a 
good friend, and a shower of the biggest 
bouquets as tribute to a pretty face — all 
returned with eagerness, with much loud 
laughing, and not seldom with a good pelt- 
ing of sweets wrapped in gold foil and with 
long streamers of colored paper attached 
to them. 

But the people one knows are not by 
any means the only ones to be favored. 
You will miss the whole kindly spirit of 
carnival if you think that. Now is the 
time to compliment any attractive person 
whom you have secretly been admiring and 
wishing to meet. Just see how a handsome 
bunch of roses with a frill of paper about 
them will be received. Make a respectful 
bow before you throw them, if you think 
best ; but at any rate throw them, and try 
your luck. And do you see that peasant 
woman at the edge of the pavement, hold- 
ing her child in strong, coarse arms? See if 
299 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


you can lodge a soft bunch of Parma vio- 
lets where the child’s shoulder is against the 
woman’s breast. Yonder also, in a mean 
house, one window is full of common, 
dull faces. Those people think they have 
no part in all this fun ; that they are too 
poor and too stupid. Make them a target, 
with the best you have. Try! and the 
kindly spirit of carnival will guide your hand. 

In the heat of the “contest” Vincent 
left his carriage for a minute and was hur- 
rying along the pavement on foot, when 
some one in the crowd turned to throw a 
bouquet directly in his face — and with all 
her force, too. It was a small woman, of 
an especially neat, plump figure, whose 
features were concealed by a grotesque 
mask; but Vincent easily recognized her 
companion — Ninety-Nine himself, shining 
in a smart new holiday suit like, a freshly 
plated false coin. 

During two hours the battle of flowers 
continued, ending then not at a given sig- 
nal, but because the participants were thor- 
oughly tired. 

Moreover one had to make preparation 
for that evening, and such preliminary 
arrangements required time. 

300 


DURING THE CARNIVAL 


For on that evening the masked ball took 
place, at the Theatre Principe Amadeo. 
True, there was to be a ball every evening 
of the gay week, but this first was to be also 
the best. 

I need not describe the masked ball, for 
it had the features common to public 
masked balls wherever they may be held, 
without having any feature of striking orig- 
inality, excepting the white devils” who 
opened each dance and implored everybody 
to be silly. There were the natural fools, 
dressed in character, shouting and thump- 
ing tambourines; here and there a timid 
soul in a domino — rather selfish people, 
these, who wanted to enjoy the sight but 
would not add to the general effect by 
wearing bright costumes; there were fine 
ladies wearing masks, as though to invite 
free speech, yet in terror lest some common 
person should ask them to dance; there 
was one man feigning to be a drunken 
priest, flirting ridiculously with a boy in 
woman’s clothes — and all the rest of it. 
But I must not neglect to speak a word in 
praise of the heroine of the evening — the 
woman whose costume merited the first 
prize. She represented day and night, and 
301 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


from top to toe she was white and black, 
snow-white on the left side, jet-black on the 
right. Wig, mask, gown, stockings, shoes, 
gloves, and even her ear-rings, carried 
out this idea with perfect consistency. 
Adroitly taking leave of her admirers and 
quitting the theater when the distribution 
of prizes was about to be made, by means 
of this timely evasion she increased the gen- 
eral interest. “Who was that bella fnasch- 
erataf people were asking each other. 
“Where is the pretty young thing in black 
and white?” 

“Not so alarmingly young,” Vincent 
might have answered; for by the merest 
chance he had recognized her. The ear- 
rings she wore — one black and the other 
white, as I have said — were big Spanish 
hoops, and had doubtless been put on to 
hide a small black dot below her left ear 
which would otherwise have betrayed her, 
being such a characteristic and pretty little 
mark. In dancing with her he caught sight 
of it, and instantly remembered that rou- 
lette-table at Monte Carlo, with the plainly 
dressed, business-like Mademoiselle Mora 
seated at it, her two little columns of gold- 
pieces and her note-book before her. Then 


302 


DURING THE CARNIVAL 


this mark had seemed the only coquettish 
item ; now it was proved that she could be 
all coquetry upon occasion. But of course. 
Waltz with any woman and you will have 
in your arms both a prude and a coquette, 
though not often at the same time a beg- 
gar and a capitalist. 

Another day of flowers and sweets was 
Tuesday (Mardi-gras), when the procession 
gained in brilliancy through the efforts 
which everybody made to win one of the 
prizes offered by the city for the best alle- 
gorical chariots, the carriages most gor- 
geously decorated, the maskers on foot most 
picturesquely attired. Who would be suc- 
cessful? Everybody tried to put on some 
finishing touch to win over the judges. 

A chariot which represented the fraternity 
and union of European nations gained the 
first prize; next in order of merit came a 
gigantic slipper, containing ladies in Turk- 
ish costume, black slaves, and the sultan him- 
self ; and third was a ^‘Car of Peace," repre- 
senting that divinity enthroned above a 
revolving world, around which were grouped 
the various races of man. But the propri- 
etors of this car of peace" were enraged 


303 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


that they had not gained the first prize, 
and proceeded to slash and smash their 
rotating world, thus exposing the goddess 
of peace to imminent danger of tumbling 
from her throne. So also one of the mask- 
ers on foot, representing Hercules, who felt 
that his merit had passed unnoticed, tried 
to carry the judges’ stand by storm, and, 
the crowd taking sides, some for him, others 
for the judges, a general row seemed likely 
to result. But the ^‘municipal guard,” 
mentioned above, restored order, and Her- 
cules was marched off between two slim 
policemen in glazed hats. 

But a week later, when Gloria and Vin- 
cent were beginning to forget that they had 
ever taken part in such a delightful and 
characteristically childish affair, they were 
equally surprised, amused, and pleased to 
receive a note from the secretary of the 
committee informing them that ^‘he had 
the honor and pleasure to announce that 
the executive committee of the carnival, at 
its session of the nth instant, had unani- 
mously awarded a banner of honor {Ban- 
diera d' O nor e) to the family at the Villa 
Mora for the elegance of their equipage at 
the Battle of Flowers.” And not long 
304 


DURING THE CARNIVAL 


after the note had been read a boy came 
marching up the mule path, singing ''Oje 
Caruli ’ and bearing the Bandiera d' Onore. 
While they were still admiring the new 
banner — a pretty thing of white satin, red 
velvet, and heavy gold embroidery — Ravelli 
called, and, after examining the trophy 
thoughtfully, as though he had something 
on his mind which he hesitated to speak 
about, said, ‘‘You made one mistake at 
the Battle of Flowers, though.” 

The only one of the two persons addressed 
who could be supposed to have made any 
mistake said, “Well, what do you mean?” 

“You remember a short-haired, common- 
looking girl in front of the Cavour restau- 
rant? You threw her flowers every time 
your carriage passed.” 

“Well, what then?” 

“A bad character, signore. She has just 
been let out of jail, and it is likely she will 
be sent back again before long if she doesn’t 
mend her ways.” 

“But I don’t see the point. Do you 
think, by any chance, she will be less likely 
to mend her ways because I threw her flow- 
ers?” 

“No, no, dear signore. It isn’t on her 
305 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


account. What do I care for her? I say 
it was a mistake for you. All San Remo is 
talking about it. After all, she is not such 
a bad-looking girl, is she?” 

So, then, all San Remo, with a sudden 
plunge from carnival into Lent, with a 
genuinely Ligurian transition, had grown 
absurdly suspicious and censorious. Evi- 
dently Lent in Italy may be quaint and 
have its charms, as well as carnival. 


306 


XXXI 

Vale 

There is a pretty view of the old town 
from the Piazza San Bernardo, where some 
ancient, gnarled and twisted olive trees 
stand, affording only a glimpse between 
their divided branches, which thus frame 
the distant scene like a rustic casement and 
make a false window out-of-doors. 

When Vincent had reached the Piazza San 
Bernardo in the course of a morning walk, he 
stopped to arrange a number of thoughts 
that had come into his head and had both- 
ered him a little since he had set out from 
home at an early hour. He stopped to 
think out these matters, and so to have 
done with them, in view of the old town, 
through the illusive casement of olive 
branches, because he had learned by experi- 
ence that agreeable suggestions were sure to 
come to him from the queer, shabby, 
cocked-hat part of San Remo. It is such 
a whimsical jumble of buildings; yet peo- 
307 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


pie live there happily, laughing away so 
much of the time they have for living. 

First of all, he had to settle a question of 
expenses. The tradespeople had been 
over-charging, it seemed ; their weekly 
accounts were much larger than he had 
expected. He took out his pocketbook 
to see how he would stand in reference to 
luxuries after paying for these contemptible 
necessities, and added up the flimsy Italian 
bank notes, with their inscriptions ^^vale 
cento lire (worth one hundred lire),” etc. 
But in view of that whimsical old town he 
could not read their denominations as 
^ Value hundred lire, fifty lire.” No; the 
word vale seemed to become Latin, and to 
mean farewell. So he had to count like 
this, ” Good-by, hundred lire; good-by, 
fifty!” until the absurdity of the notion that 
each bank note was ready to go, and said so 
plainly on its face, changed his humor. 

Why, just look at that crazy old town. 
What can be expected of people who live 
in such a place? They have to laugh, and 
cheat, and laugh again. 

* * * 

And then the absurd conduct of the 
office boys” — that had to be thought out 
308 


VALE 


also. You see, Gloria and Vincent could 
not dine the whole battalion at once, so 
they naturally invited the officers in detach- 
ments. What did the guests make of this? 
Why, the first detachment assumed that 
they were always to be favored above the 
rest, and were insulted when the others had 
been impartially received. ‘Wou have 
other friends now; you don’t care for us 
now,” said the first detachment, sulking 
like children. 

Such amiable nonsense! 

^‘Suppose we should give a masquerade,” 
said Vincent to himself, “and ask all the 
officers at once.” 

The idea of a masquerade had no sooner 
presented itself than it was accepted, and 
Vincent fell to arranging the details of the 
plan. Villa Mora was small, to be sure, 
but the musicians could be stationed in the 
hall; both the drawing-room and the din- 
ing-room could be cleared for dancing, to 
make more space; the garden might be 
lighted with colored lamps hung from the 
trees ; matting could be laid along the gravel 
walks, seats put in the arbor, and rustic 
benches in secluded corners. Yes, evi- 
dently the thing was feasible enough. 

309 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


But when should this ball be given? They 
were now in Lent ; it would be better to 
wait until that had passed. On the other 
hand, the lease of the Villa Mora would 
expire before long, and this reminded Vin- 
cent that he had been meaning to speak 
with the agent about taking the house for 
another season. He would go to see the 
agent immediately. 

So Vincent hurried on, passing through 
the market-place, where Tommasina was 
bargaining for lettuce and water-cress and 
radishes. There is to be a good salad for 
our luncheon,” Vincent thought. 

Presently he arrived at the agency; but 
there he was treated to a surprise which he 
found in part rather provoking and in part 
decidedly pleasant. 

For when he had stated his intention to 
the polite agent the latter said: ”I was 
just going to look you up about that very 
matter. Here is a letter from the owner, 
saying that she and her husband are coming 
to live at the villa as soon as your present 
term is out.” 

“Her husband?” Vincent repeated. 

“Yes; it seems she has married a fellow 
who has been hanging around here most of 
310 


VALE 


the winter. You must have noticed him. 
He wears a cloak all the time, and — ” 

‘‘Looks like Victor Emanuel?” Vincent 
interrupted. 

“That’s the chap.” 

Now this polite house-agent was a tre- 
mendously tall man, but for an instant after 
he had imparted the disagreeable news that 
the villa must be restored to its owner so 
soon, Vincent disliked every inch of him. 

And yet there was still to be considered 
the other side of the question — the decidedly 
pleasant side — as Vincent realized a little 
later. 

For twenty years or so Mademoiselle 
Mora had cherished in her heart one pur- 
pose — the purpose to overcome all obstacles 
separating her from her lover. As she 
grew older the passionate love which had 
inspired this purpose cooled ; that was inevi- 
table ; while the purpose itself, the particular 
form in which her ambition was cast, be- 
came more and more strong, as a mental 
habit. The natural tendency of her artistic 
career, with this earnest informing purpose, 
had been to subdue emotions and cultivate 
the intellectual part. When, however, she 
came face to face with that disappointing 
3 ” 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


Ninety-Nine and realized at once all his uh- 
worthiness, the emotional side of her nature, 
rendered more potent than usual by the 
circumstances of the meeting, asserted 
itself against the shabby old ghost of a lover, 
and scored a triumph — but only a temporary 
triumph. The result just announced was 
really not surprising. Her purpose had 
finally carried the day, as it was sure to do 
sooner or later, being the strongest force in 
a matured character. For years she had 
been fancying that she wanted this old 
lover, whereas in truth she just wanted to 
have her own way, and to dispose of her life 
as she had planned it. Surely every one 
rejoices to see a plucky little woman suc- 
ceed ; and this marriage was perhaps the 
only form of success possible for Mademoi- 
selle Mora — her high note. 

* * * 

When that good salad of lettuce, water- 
cress, radishes, and olives was put on at 
luncheon, Vincent turned and turned it over 
and over in the deep bowl, oftener than was 
necessary, while inwardly debating the 
question whether or no it would be wise 
to communicate this last bit of news. To 
communicate it would seem like insisting 
312 








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VALE 


that there had been some truth revealed by 
his false windows, after all. So finally he 
put it in this way : 

^‘We have perhaps been long enough in 
San Remo. The place is beginning to lose 
that delightful novelty which made its charm 
at first — when it seemed charmingly Italian 
to be informed by the clerk at the post office 
that he had no stamps for our letters, but 
thought he might receive some in the course 
of the day.” 

**Oh, there is a letter, out of a clear 
sky,” Gloria was reminded, and sent the 
maid to bring it. 

” Riviera life is now getting too familiar,” 
Vincent continued; “one of us can’t even 
sneeze in the public street now without 
hearing somebody cry ^ Sant^!' ” 

Perhaps it was Gloria’s chance expression 
“out of a clear sky;” at any rate something 
prompted Vincent to take the letter which 
the maid brought and open it in the draw- 
ing-room. It was from his London banker, 
enclosing a cable despatch from Mr. Tas- 
well Langdon at Washington: “ War within 
a monthy Langdon had considerately 
avoided telegraphing directly to the San 
313 


VENGEANCE OF THE FEMALE 


Remo address, because the contents of a 
telegram could not so easily be kept from 
Gloria. 

And this friendly deception was so thor- 
oughly successful that it was not even 
necessary for Gloria to know that a mes- 
senger was sent down the mule path and 
into the town with this reply: 

“Taswell Langdon, Arlington Hotel, Wash- 
ington: 

“Offer my services to President and Secretary War. 

“ Vincent.’’ 

Only a f^w minutes had passed, at the 
very beginning of a marvellous Italian after- 
noon. Gloria was still absorbed in the 
thoughts which Vincent had suggested, and 
she spoke to him, when he sat down behind 
the salad-bowl again, as though there had 
been no interruption. 

“Let’s go back,” said Gloria. 

“To New York?” 

“To him^" said Gloria. 

Vincent and Gloria looked at each other 
across the table. There was really no un- 
certainty in the mind of either, for, of those 
two human motives which are incalculably 
potent — love of offspring and love of coun- 
try — her nature obeyed one and his nature 
314 


VALE 


obeyed the other at that moment. But 
they seemed to be debating the question of 
their return to America, without a word, 
merely with the questioning and consenting 
glances of kind eyes, as had been their cus- 
tom in the days of reticent courtship. 

Yes, but this was more blessed, for now 
each saw in the other’s face the features of 
their boy at school in America, and of their 
daughter; and whereas untried love had 
taught them to conjugate altruistically, im- 
perfectly, ‘‘We, You, I,” now the present 
tense of every happy verb began, “He” 
and “She” — and then came “We,” and 
then “You,” and last of all, “I.” 

This book is a little book of travel, but 
its conclusion is from the grammar of life. 

THE END. 


315 


A Note on Bull-Fighting 

(Extract From Mr. Langdon’s Sevillian Com- 
mon-place Book) 

The formal title of our club is “Circulo de Labra- 
dores y Proprietarios,” which means “society of culti- 
vators and landed proprietors”; but, far from being 
an agricultural society (I wish it were an agricultural 
society, for the enormous fertile plain of the Guadal- 
quivir is sadly in need of improved agricultural 
methods), it is the aristocratic club, perhaps the most 
wasteful and elegant in all Andalusia — the principal 
room being decorated with divans, Moorish arches, 
and men who talk about young women and bulls. 
Behind this is a deep narrow room supplied with 
card-tables, and adjoining it on the same floor is a 
billiard room and a private hair-dresser’s shop. 
Above, on the second floor, are the reading-room, 
library, and fencing-room, with various parlors and 
more card-rooms. 

But I need not further describe the building, as I 
have already said that the membership is aristocratic, 
and the aristocratic Spaniard is inclined to be cosmo- 
politan, building his club in the jikeness of London 
and New York clubs. 

I only want to tell the story of McLean. 

“It was at Cadiz, that this thing happened,” said 
a tall blonde Spanish member of our club. “There 
was a Scotch-American named McLean, chief engi- 
neer of one of the Transatlantic Company’s ships, 
316 


NOTE 


present at a bull-fight. I was there myself. I saw 
it all. Well, this McLean was there with a lot of 
other engineers — all in drink. Two bulls had been 
killed when McLean left his friends and walked out 
into the ring. Taking his stand before the president’s 
box, he called to that officer, in a queer mixture of 
Spanish and English, ‘You permit me to matar bull 
—to kill toro? ’ The president understood matar and 
toro, and the engineer’s meaning was plain; so per- 
mission was granted. The professionals (the cuad- 
rilla) left the field clear for him; the bugles sounded; 
the door of the toril was opened; the bull appeared — 
the third bull. Then McLean in his shirt sleeves 
awaited the charge of the bull, caught the black 
beast by the horns, shook him, turned him, mastered 
him, without a weapon. So they stood facing each 
other for a moment — McLean shaking his fist, the 
bull afraid to come at him again. Then the bull ran 
away and leaped over a barrier. The man stood 
alone in that great ring, while ten thousand specta- 
tors screamed and shouted with wonder and admira- 
tion. He had no more to do, except to salute the presi- 
dent, for his task was finished; but I assure you he 
was as sober when he went out as he was drunk when 
he went in.” 

A tall blonde Spaniard, Felipe Dartiaga by name, 
told this story at the club this afternoon in Holy 
Week, and I have translated it as above because it 
leads straight to a most essential difference between 
Spaniards and Americans or Englishmen, or Scots, or 
Irishmen — all three at one in the manly art, and the 
love of it. The narrator of the story himself wore Eng- 
lish clothes, affected English manners, and with his 
light hair had rather the look of an Englishman. (I 
may observe parenthetically that blondes are not very 
rare in the upper classes of Seville — neither are tall 

317 


NOTE 


people — neither are Anglomaniacs. The “small, 
dark Spaniard ” of conventional literature has some 
big white-skinned brothers and sisters in real life.) 

Of the other gentlemen whom this story drew to- 
gether in an attentive group around Dartiaga, some 
wore pointed beards and close-cropped hair in the 
French style; others were like the narrator. The 
distinctively Spanish style, is restricted to the common 
people. Even the capa, or Spanish cloak, is not 
considered good form. Gentlemen still wrap their 
faces in it when they go out at night, but for use 
during the day, in cold weather, the local dandies 
must have a covert coat and top hat. 

So, then, these gentlemen at the club looked more 
or less like Englishmen or Frenchmen as they stood 
talking with Spanish violence and Spanish gestures 
about bulls; but all acknowledged that McLean was 
inimitable. 

I have it from another source that McLean was 
lost at sea. I can’t say he was drowned. That phrase 
will do for smaller men, but such a splendid fellow 
must have gone down like a ship. 


PRINTED BY R. R. DONNELLEY 
AND SONS COMPANY AT THE 
LAKESIDE PRESS, CHICAGO, ILL. 


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